Rose Conway-Walsh (Mayo, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

As the Minister has said, the NDP was reviewed and the targets for capital investment as a percentage of GNI* were set in 2021. The revised NDP also set out departmental capital ceilings for 2025. In budget 2024, we saw the Government stay within those NDP ceilings. The 2021 targets set for 2023 and 2024 were 4.9% and 5.1% respectively, as the Minister has said. The Department now estimates that the rates will be 4.1% and 4.3% so there is a 0.8% shortfall in both years, 15% behind profile for both years. By my calculations, this is a shortfall of €2.3 billion or €2.4 billion in each year. Does this not mean that the Government is far behind on capital investment in real terms?

Why was budget 2024 not used as an opportunity to address the shortfall in capital investment? We saw no additional capital investment in housing despite the ongoing housing crisis and we had issues earlier in the year with capital for education.

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