Matt Shanahan (Waterford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Yesterday, during Leaders' Questions, I put to the Taoiseach, as I have done before, data obtained from replies to parliamentary questions to demonstrate that the three successive Governments of which he was a part from 2016 to 2020 unfairly distributed public capital spending. Projects in Ministers' constituencies proceed while elsewhere they are stuck in the hell of public procurement. In his response to me yesterday regarding the south east, the Taoiseach name-checked some projects and intimated that I was wrong. To what percentage of the €12 billion in capital spending voted last year are the people of the south east entitled? What percentage, even a ballpark figure, does the Taoiseach think they probably got? The data I have show systemic long-term per capitaunderfunding in many areas, including acute healthcare, certainly higher education and almost every discretionary spending you care to analyse. As opposed to offering subjective anecdotes about equitable regional spending, I invite the Taoiseach to prove me wrong with verifiable data on this subject matter.

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