Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party)
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Question 6: To ask the Taoiseach the progress made by the cross-departmental team on infrastructure and public private partnerships; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1457/05]

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Question 7: To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the January 2005 meeting of the cross-departmental team on infrastructure and public private partnerships; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2455/05]

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Question 8: To ask the Taoiseach when the cross-departmental team on infrastructure and public private partnerships will next meet; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2456/05]

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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Question 9: To ask the Taoiseach the number of occasions during 2004 on which the cross-departmental team on infrastructure and public private partnership met; when the committee will next meet; if he will report on the work of the team to date; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3501/05]

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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Question 10: To ask the Taoiseach when the cross-departmental team on housing, infrastructure and PPPs last met; and its planned meetings for 2005. [3695/05]

Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)
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Question 11: To ask the Taoiseach the progress made by the cross-departmental group on infrastructure and public private partnership; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4487/05]

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 6 to 11 together.

The meeting of the cross-departmental team on housing, infrastructure and PPPs scheduled for January was amalgamated with the most recent meeting on 2 February. The reason is that important preparatory work in one of the principle agenda items, namely, strategic national infrastructure, was still ongoing when the January meeting was scheduled to have taken place. It is expected that the Government will formally consider the outputs of that work in the very near future. The other main agenda item was the national spatial strategy with an emphasis on progress to date and plans for the year.

A further meeting of the team is being held today. Agenda items are: housing, particularly in the context of recent reports from the National Economic and Social Council and the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution; strategic national infrastructure, especially proposals to expedite delivery; and the transport investment programme under the ten year envelope.

In general terms, the team and the Cabinet committee to which it reports serve a valuable role in progressing and resolving issues related to infrastructural planning and delivery. To that end the team continued to make a major contribution throughout last year and met on ten separate occasions. I have reported to the House separately on those meetings.

Overall, the team has helped to improve significantly the context for the delivery of national infrastructure, especially in terms of time and cost. A particularly important feature of the team's work last year was related to the roll out of the multi-annual financial envelopes for the various broad categories of infrastructure activity. The House can be assured that the team will continue to make an important contribution throughout this year.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Does the Taoiseach expect that the national development programme will be completed on time? How far off schedule does he expect it to be given the remarks made recently by the Institution of Engineers of Ireland with regard to the multi-annual funding network which was announced? Does the Taoiseach expect to have it completed within the time limit or will it be off schedule by three to five years?

The Taoiseach mentioned there is a meeting today about housing. I am sure the Taoiseach has had his eyes opened, as many other Deputies have had, by the huge conurbations outside the city in Meath and Kildare. The clumping of huge housing estates without infrastructure is a social crime of enormous consequence.

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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That is a question for the line Minister.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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This is a question on the cross-departmental team which the Taoiseach will deal with on the housing issue. My question is valid in that sense. Does that committee discuss the concept of housing whereby if 1,000 or 2,000 houses are to be built in a certain place, there will be a concurrent proposal to construct the schools, leisure facilities, playgrounds and so forth, so those who pay their deposit in the first instance can know in advance the bus routes and public facilities that will be available? I have seen some of these estates in the last few weeks and——

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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Again, Deputy Kenny, these are questions for the line Minister.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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A Cheann Comhairle, you have become very tetchy in the last couple of days.

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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No.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I am asking a question about a cross-departmental team dealing with housing. Is anything wrong with that?

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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The details of what is discussed at the cross-departmental committee——

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Did I mention any specific location? I mentioned housing as a concept.

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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Each Minister is responsible for their line Department in the areas for which they have responsibility. The Taoiseach is not specifically responsible for these detailed questions——

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I did not suggest he was. I asked the Taoiseach if the cross-departmental team dealing with housing discusses such issues. This is about people and their lives.

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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The details of what it discusses is not appropriate under these questions. The Deputy's question asked about the meeting of the cross-departmental team on infrastructure and public private partnerships and asked the Taoiseach to make a statement on the matter.

Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Yes, that is part of it. You, a Cheann Comhairle, no longer need to canvass because of your privileged position here but if you had been in some of the housing estates I have been in during the last couple of weeks, you would understand what I am saying.

Rory O'Hanlon (Cavan-Monaghan, Ceann Comhairle)
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I would have put down my question to the line Minister.

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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Obviously, these issues are discussed in various fora, not just in the committee. The reason for national planning, balanced regional development and the national spatial strategy, on which we worked over the last few years, was to deal with the type of issues mentioned by the Deputy. The Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government is currently developing terms of reference for a study of the needs of gateways. That proposal has been approved by the cross-departmental team and it is anticipated the project will be completed by the middle of this year.

A few things have happened. One is the impact of the national development plan projects in overcoming infrastructure barriers. There are also the strategic infrastructural requirements of the gateway areas. The reason the national spatial strategy provided that all local authorities must have regional planning guidelines was to deal with the issue raised by the Deputy. They must examine how development is conducted. I have seen some of these developments. They provide grand housing but there were no regional planning guidelines in the past. However, they are now in place and people must consider from the start of the development where the school, community centre and so forth will be.

Deputy Rabbitte is probably far more knowledgeable than I about what happened in the Tallaght and Clondalkin area 30 years ago, when that mistake was made. It would be regrettable if we were still making the same mistake. We had to go back into those areas and provide schools, playgrounds and parks 30 years later. Of course, that turned the community around. Nowadays, developments are being built in areas where there is no problem with open space — if anything, in some cases they are being built on too open a space — so I cannot understand why they cannot get the school right.

Out of curiosity, I checked a few developments in recent days to find out if it was a case of the Department of Education and Science messing up. However, I discovered that in many cases the places were opened before the applications were even put forward. To be frank, it is just bad organisation in planning development. I accept that councillors work hard. There is a planned new development in Navan of approximately 1,200 houses. Last week I looked at a plan shown to me by the chairman of a community council and I discussed it will Deputy Cullen. Nobody could find any road other than the existing one. I was never an engineer and I would not be much good if I ever tried to study for that profession but if one is building 1,200 houses, it is a basic requirement to provide a road from it to the main road and not use a road that is already overcrowded. This is basic stuff.

Colleagues have told me that the answer to this is the regional planning guidelines. In the context of the national spatial strategy and the gateways, the purpose and logic of why the technical people have argued about ways to do this is to ensure that planning is dealt with in a far broader way. It is not an issue of putting 600 or 1,000 houses in Mornington or any of the other areas we have visited recently and then, when they are half built, to consider building a school given that there might be children in the houses. If the development is taking four or five years, it should be done in a better way.

I have also seen areas where that was done well, often because of good public representatives or councillors. These people were often berated because they wanted to get the development right and argued for it. Many local authorities oblige developers to make a contribution. There was a row in the House a few years ago about these contributions. However, it should not be a cost that is passed on. If the prices we hear one can get for houses are correct, the cost of the contribution should not be added to the price of the house. We argued about this and urban development costs in the House. The developer should be able to fund a contribution to the schools, roads and other facilities out of the huge profits. Local authorities are seeking this for the last three or four years, and so they should. It was argued in the House that it would just be put onto the price of houses. However, with the size of some of these estates, the developer has six or seven years work and is making an enormous profit so he has an obligation to pay towards development costs, probably even more than the existing amounts.

I did not notice that in the Institution of Engineers of Ireland report or a suggestion of what we should do. I accept many of the points the institution makes but developers should pay towards development costs.

Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)
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I agree with the Taoiseach's comments but I am not sure it is happening in practice. While we are swapping anecdotes, one community in Meath told me that the site for the school is designated and, after it is rezoned, the Department must buy it back at the rezoned value. If that type of thing happens, it is extraordinary. I agree with the Taoiseach's comments about the experience of the western towns.

I was in Sallins recently where people told me there is a big problem with the primary school and that their three and four year old children cannot be enrolled in secondary school. Is it not the case that there is no secondary school available? Naas CBS cannot take them so parents are presented with private education in Newbridge as the only prospect. As Deputy Kenny said, there is an amazing deficit in facilities in this area of developmental explosion of recent years. Is a significant number of projects contemplated as a result of ironing out the difficulties with public private partnerships? The Committee of Public Accounts heard some time ago that such moneys as had been made available from the pension reserve fund for infrastructure projects had not been called on and no projects have been brought forward despite the manifest requirement.

Deputy Kenny dealt with another matter. The report from the Institution of Engineers of Ireland is far more critical than one would divine from the Taoiseach's response. Did the experts who compiled that report suggest we are not within a mile of hitting the national development plan target because we are so far behind today?

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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Whatever about past schemes, a process is now in place in regard to the gateways, hubs and regional planning guidelines. With many developments of the past year or two, the developer simply gave the land site as part of the development, which is what should happen. The Deputy is correct in regard to other cases in older developments where this was not part of the overall development. In these cases, the State has not got the sites and people will obviously try to zone the sites to sell them to the State at a higher cost. However, if it was done as part of the regional planning guidelines at the commencement, the State should not pay anything for these sites; it should be part of the overall development. That is happening and there are many good examples of vigilant public representatives of all political parties co-operating to achieve this. This is the way it should be but, unfortunately, guidelines were not in place previously and developers were able to push these developments through, probably by applying pressure, without making much contribution, such as providing some open space. The regional planning guidelines will force that to change.

I accept many of the positive points made in the report of the Institution of Engineers of Ireland. We have invested hundreds of millions of euro more than was planned in the national development plan, yet there are areas where we are behind. The institution correctly identifies some of these areas. Where did the money go? In many cases, it was eaten up due to under estimation, changes to the design of projects, cost inflation and also engineer's inflation. Many of these factors have caused resources to be used up and, therefore, we are behind in some areas.

In other cases, however, we have gone beyond the national development plan. For example, the multi-annual envelopes for 2005 to 2009 will see approximately €33.4 billion invested in the capital programme, which must be factored in. However, the institution makes positive suggestions.

A section of the National Treasury Management Agency is considering the issue of public private partnership. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Cowen, has, to his credit, given much time since the budget to consideration of this area. He is considering changes to structures and spent a whole day with people involved in PPP, listening to their cases and to what they think is wrong, to find if there is some other way we can make the system work.

With regard to some major projects, I have tried to achieve private sector engagement but it is not easy. Some say the process does not work and when one tries to get the private sector to organise a major project, one does not get the feeling the sector is clear on the idea. Some projects around Dublin city would be ideal if the private sector was prepared to take them over, for example, the completion by tunnel of the M50 going south. This project would probably cost well over €1 billion if the private sector wanted to take it up, and it would not go wrong if it wanted it for 30 or 40 years. However, the private sector tends to pull away from these projects.

The State will never be able to complete all of these projects. Therefore, we must find some imaginative way of involving the pension fund in this. The Minister, Deputy Cowen, is working on this at present.

The private sector has become involved in the M50 project and some other projects. However, it should take the really big money. We will not need the pension fund money for 20 to 25 years. My view, given the demographics, is that we will not need it for far longer. I do not understand how, on one side, some say we will need it in the years 2025 to 2030 and, on the other side, some say there will be 1 million extra people at that time. I do not believe this doomsday scenario will happen.

We should be able put aside more of this money. The pension fund managers will invest the resources but it must be a private sector driven project. I have yet to see someone coming forward with a vehicle that will lead to this. However, having listened to what the people say they need, the Minister, Deputy Cowen, is reconsidering the matter.

Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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I note the Taoiseach had his Duracells changed this morning. On an area that was not addressed, has the cross-departmental team with responsibility for housing considered the issue of housing in the private rented sector? Is the Taoiseach aware that the number of households in receipt of rent supplement now exceeds 40% of the entire private rented sector? This is a statistic learned from a recent Parliamentary Question to the Minister for Social and Family Affairs. Does the Taoiseach accept it is clear these people should be accommodated within the social rented sector as the State is massively subsidising the private rented sector, and this statistic only underscores it? Will the Taoiseach reply to the specifics of my questions?

Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)
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We often warn in this House of the danger of moneylenders and loan sharks. Is the Taoiseach alarmed that some PPPs are much more expensive than the public sector component? The Kilcock-Kinnegad section, for example, cost €1.1 million less per kilometre than the private sector section of that project. Is there any measure to end this type of gross profiteering from the private sector? How will a PPP work, for example, in regard to building, as proposed by Government, a prison on the Dublin-Meath border? Will it be responsible for security and maintenance or just for construction?

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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While the committee does not deal with Deputy Ó Caoláin's question, generally, the private rented sector is an important part of housing policy. The changes we have introduced in that area have significantly reduced the private sector rented market. It is continuing to decline dramatically, even in the heart of Dublin, which is a major change. If many in that sector could access affordable or social housing, it is undoubted they would be happier. However, the State is subsidising them in accommodation, in many cases where they are happiest and from where they do not want to move. It is not one size fits all.

There are many arguments about PPPs which time does not permit me to go into. However, another argument suggests that PPP projects are coming in on cost and on or ahead of time — the Monasterevin bypass was nearly a year ahead and the Kinnegad project is going well. There are efficiencies of scale and there will also be efficiencies in regard to maintenance. While cost is a factor, if one was to wait to undertake projects in the traditional way, there would be increased delays and difficulties. We are spending increased resources in recent years —€1.4 billion on roads and €1.2 billion on rail, and we must find the most effective way of completing projects which does not only concern cost.

Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)
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What of the prison?

Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)
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There is a cost involved in doing it this way. In terms of speed, efficiency, volume and capacity, one must give some projects to the private sector.

Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)
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What of the prison? Is this the case for security?