Results 281-300 of 483 for speaker:Edward Timmins

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: National Planning Framework (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: From a national point of view, councils must be closely involved in the delivery of housing. Delivery must be micromanaged. These county targets must be drilled down further, with monthly figures produced by all local authorities of actual homes built versus targets and explanations given. This is the only way to deliver large numbers of houses. The Minister must then meet the CEOs of the...

An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: The N81 national road runs from Tallaght in south Dublin through west Wicklow and onward to Carlow. It functions as the principal transport artery for west Wicklow and parts of counties Kildare and Carlow. I will make two major points. The N81 is one of the most dangerous roads in the country, as proven by several studies. Second, the N81 is the only national road out of Dublin that has...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I ask everyone to put all mobile phones and devices on silent. Before we begin, I wish to explain some limitations to parliamentary privilege and the practice of the Houses as regards references witnesses may make to other persons in their evidence. They are protected under absolute privilege in respect of the presentation they make to the committee. This means they have an absolute...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I agree with much of what the witnesses have said, even though there were some sweeping statements there. In the area of taxes, a lot of the tax we rely on is income tax from people employed by the multinationals. It does not get as much coverage as the corporation tax. I have around ten questions. Do all of the council's spending warnings take account of inflation and population...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: It is often lost on the public. One may see a 7% increase in the budget but it is just in order to stand still. In real terms-----

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Does the council distinguish between capital expenditure and day-to-day expenditure in terms of its warnings? The council's warnings are broad. I do not think that capital expenditure and the investment in infrastructure should have the same level of warnings because of the returns the country gets.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Does the council not analyse the different areas of the budget and say, "God, this area of the budget shot up and this area did not"?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Does the council point out where the expenditure increases are, rather than just a blanket assessment across the board?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Does the council not comment on every Department? Mr. Coffey referred to the overspend in health and there are good reasons for that which people understand. Does the council not comment on whether one Department's expenditure is too high while another's is okay?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I do not mean to focus on health. I need to focus on everything else. I will move on because I have two minutes left. In the opening statement, Mr. Coffey referred to employment increasing by 500,000 since 2019 and that it is focused mainly on multinationals and the public sector. I would have thought there was significant job growth in other areas as well. Does he have a breakdown of...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I am just interested in the figures. What is the figure for the public sector?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: And the multinationals?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: That leaves a balance of about 200,000. I wanted to get a breakdown of that.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: In the opening statement, the phrase "pumped money into an economy" was used. Is the council referring to cost of living expenses there? In the same paragraph, a deficit of €2,500 per worker is referred to. Is that the underlying deficit I referred to earlier, of €4.2 billion this year and €6.4 billion next year?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I have a few questions. In its opening statement, the council says that spending overruns from last year were not taken into account when budgeting for 2025 and that this has been a repeated issue in recent years. That seems like a very basic thing to be happening. I cannot understand why it is happening. Do our guests have any quick answers as to why that is happening?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: The council talks about good planning and medium-term budgeting requiring forecasts to go on more than 20 months ahead. I could not agree more. I have raised here and in many other fora the fact that we need to be looking five or ten years ahead. The medium-term fiscal and structural plan does look five years ahead, although it does not go into the level of detail that we would like a...

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: I would suggest that we look ten years ahead, especially as we know what is going to happen with demographics and pensions in ten or 15 years' time. Would it be fair to say we should be looking further down the line?

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Twenty years or a generation.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: Mr. Coffey referred to GDP. We all know GDP, leprechaun economics, call them what you like. In fairness, the Minister for Finance has based a lot of his figures on what he calls modified domestic demand. I know this is not GNI* but to make that comment, the finance Minister does recognise the limitations of GDP.

Committee on Budgetary Oversight: Fiscal Assessment Report: Engagement with the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (1 Jul 2025)

Edward Timmins: The witnesses referred to Ireland's infrastructure being 25% behind its peers. I am interested to know how you came up with that figure of 25%.