Results 14,041-14,060 of 34,135 for speaker:Paschal Donohoe

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Shared Services (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: I will answer the Deputy's last question first, if I may. We will need to do a benchmarking exercise to compare where we are vis-à-visother European countries. However, my sense is that we need to wait a little bit longer before doing so. The NSSO is still a relatively new organisation. While much of the work that needs to be done in terms of the movement of staff and so on is...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Shared Services (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: The office does not play any significant role in procurement beyond the procurement processes in which it is involved itself. In terms of expansion into the HSE, it will be some time before such a process begins, given the number of people that the HSE employs

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Shared Services (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: We have yet to make a decision on it. My hope is that once we ensure that the work of the NSSO is successful and grows, there will be an opportunity to look at that question in the future. However, there are 90,000 to 100,000 people working in the HSE at the moment and it would be a very big decision to replicate what they do, given the huge number of payment systems that are already in...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Public Spending Code (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Let me tell the Deputy about the kinds of project that have been delivered on time and on budget and are making a difference to communities the length and breadth of our country, but about which we will never hear any acknowledgement from him or Sinn Féin more widely - the N11; the Tralee bypass; the Gort-Tuam road; the Belturbet bypass; the infrastructure upgrade of our Luas; the north...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Public Spending Code (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Equally, we are resolute in ensuring in the decisions that are still available to us that value is achieved and improvements are made in how the children's hospital is delivered.

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Public Spending Code (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: I assure the Deputy that I do not take any offence at what he says. While finding him professional and on top of all the detail every time I deal with him, that is always mixed with continual rage towards me. I do not take any offence at that because I am focused on trying to ensure that we can learn from what went wrong and make improvements where possible while also laying out in a...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2020 (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Each year, there are certain categories of expenditure that are treated as pre-committed for the purposes of the Estimates process. In shaping the allocation of resources in budget 2020, these included demographics, public service pay agreements, the carryover of certain budgetary measures and the capital expenditure increases under the national development plan. For 2020, that figure was...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2020 (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Did the Deputy say it was €60 million?

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Budget 2020 (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Indeed. Turning to the Deputy's point on the impact of demographics, the life expectancy of women in Ireland was 83.3 years in 2015 while it was 79.3 years for men. That was a large and welcome change compared with where we were a number of decades ago, but it all has consequences for the pre-commitments we need to make. As to how this affects the budgetary process, between early...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Climate Change Policy (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: My Department has been assigned direct responsibility for the implementation of 18 steps across 12 separate actions under the Government’s climate action plan. These actions are due for completion in 2019 and 2020. To give the Deputy a flavour of the actions already completed, my Department is looking at reforms to the public spending code that will require a more realistic cost...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Climate Change Policy (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: I am not sure how the Deputy can make the claim from my answer that I am changing my thinking on the carbon tax. I did not say that in the answer I gave him. What I did say was that we were looking at the role of pricing in the context of the public spending code to ensure, for example, that we would better evaluate road projects against what might be a public transport alternative. In...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Climate Change Policy (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: I believe - I will confirm it with the Minister, Deputy Bruton - that what we are talking about is making different use of the existing PSO levy. The Deputy sounds very like somebody who believes we need to make a transition to a low carbon economy and that we need to respond to climate change but is denying that there will be costs involved.

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Climate Change Policy (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: There will be costs involved. I do not know whether the format allows me to hear the Deputy's views on an increase in carbon tax, but if he is saying we can make the change to a low carbon economy without it involving changes for many citizens, respectfully, he is wrong. Even through what we have done on carbon pricing, we have put in place additional measures to try to support and protect...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Public Spending Code (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: The majority of recent projects have been delivered on time and within budget. There is a high level of professionalism in public investment across the various sectors. Ireland's public investment management systems are not static. They are regularly reviewed. In that context, my Department has been engaged in intensive work to update the public spending code. We have had a consultation...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Capital Expenditure Programme (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Deputy Pearse Doherty referred to hardworking families, hardworking mothers and fathers, the young children who were depending on schools being completed and hospitals being available to them, if needed. They are the very same people for whom we are seeking to deliver projects such as the national children's hospital and the national broadband plan. It is in order that young children can...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Estimates Process (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: The Supplementary Estimate, on which the Deputy's final question touched, includes some funding for the winter initiative plan. I clarify that point because the Deputy put that question to me. We are simply ensuring that the health service is recruiting for posts for which there is a budget. The total funding available to the Department of Health is at the very high level of €17.4...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Capital Expenditure Programme (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: I propose to take Questions Nos. 2 and 4 together. As I have previously indicated, I intend to provide the capital required to fund the additional cost of proceeding with the national broadband project from future revenues.  This will be done, and has been done, in the context of updating the overall capital ceilings set out in Project Ireland 2040.  This means that the decision...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Capital Expenditure Programme (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Deputy Doherty asked me what we are doing to learn from the situation in respect of the national children's hospital, which I have said is unacceptable. We are in the final stages of revising our public spending code to ensure that the delivery of projects of huge scale is managed better than the delivery of the national children's hospital. He made reference to school projects, primary...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Estimates Process (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: Expenditure Report 2020 outlined the requirement for Supplementary Estimates for a number of Votes in 2019. These supplementary provisions arise as a result of policy decisions, including the provision of a 100% Christmas bonus, and expenditure pressures, particularly in the health sector. At that point, it was estimated that the aggregate amount required for Supplementary Estimates would...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Estimates Process (14 Nov 2019)

Paschal Donohoe: To give further context to where we are with the Supplementary Estimates, while they continue to be at a level which I want to see reduced further, they are significantly lower than they were a year ago. I said last year that a number of things which happened from September onwards would not be repeated, and they have not been repeated. Furthermore, the Supplementary Estimates for this year...