Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Leas-Chathaoirleach and all Senators on their election. I look forward to working with Members from various panels and the university seats.

As the line Minister with responsibility for tourism and sport, I congratulate the Republic of Ireland football team on its fantastic result last night. I am sure all Senators and the Leas-Chathaoirleach will agree it was a fantastic result for the country. I see my predecessor, the Minister of State, Deputy Michael Ring, in the Gallery. They are all asking for him in sport but they are in safe hands.

I thank the Senator for raising this matter which I am taking on behalf of the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Shane Ross, who is out of the country. Much of what the Senator said resonates with me as I come from west Limerick, a predominantly rural area too. While we have a large urban centre in Limerick city, the majority of the constituency I represent mirrors the area the Senator’s. Accordingly, I am acutely aware of this issue.

The improvement and maintenance of regional and local roads in Monaghan and other counties is the statutory responsibility of the local authority, in accordance with the provisions of section 13 of the Roads Act 1993. Works on those roads are funded from the council's own resources supplemented by State road grants. The initial selection and prioritisation of works to be funded is also a matter for the local authority.

Ireland has just under 100,000 km of road in its network and the maintenance and improvement of roads places a substantial financial burden on local authorities and on the Exchequer. Due to the national financial position, there have been large reductions in Exchequer funding available for roads expenditure over the past several years. For this reason, the focus has been on maintenance and renewal rather than major new improvement schemes.

In January this year, my predecessor, the then Minister of Transport, Tourism and Sport, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, announced the 2016 regional and local road allocations, of which Monaghan County Council was allocated €7.16 million.In February and May of this year, as part of the tranche 1 and 2 funding to local authorities to remedy damage caused by severe weather, Monaghan County Council received additional funding, bringing the total for regional and local roads in the county in 2016 to €12.3 million. All available funding for 2016 has now been allocated. An important change was made last year arising from the introduction of the local property tax, LPT, and the Government commitment that local authorities will retain 80% of revenues from 2015. Under this new arrangement the four Dublin councils became fully self-funding in respect of the main regional and local road maintenance and rehabilitation programmes.

In addition, the Department has emphasised to the councils that will continue to receive Exchequer and local road grants that the commitment of local authorities to contribute significantly from their own resources towards the cost of improving and maintaining the regional and local roads network is essential and that full consideration needs to be given to utilising the local property tax to boost their own resources. For the next number of years the financial realities are that the budgets proposed by my Department indicate that capital funding will continue to be very tight, limiting the scope for progressing additional new projects over and above the public private partnerships, PPP, programme that is already in place and the projects prioritised in the capital plan. It is important, however, to note that the seven-year transport capital plan does provide for the gradual build-up of capital funding for the road network from the current relatively low base towards levels needed to support maintenance and aid and improve works.

The capital plan published in September 2015 outlined proposed transport investment priorities to 2022. The transport element of the plan was framed by conclusions reached in the Department's Strategic Investment Framework for Land Transport. This report highlighted the importance of maintenance and renewal of transport infrastructure, together with targeted investments to address particular bottlenecks and critical safety issues. The capital plan provides €6 billion for investment in the road network in the period to 2022, with €4.4 billion earmarked for maintenance and strengthening of the existing extensive network throughout the country and €1.6 billion for new projects.

I think we are all conscious that the recovery of the economy is generating spending pressures across the Government system, including capital investment needs. As part of the programme for partnership Government there is an increased emphasis on the need for spending on public services, but the Government still has to operate within the EU fiscal rules and this does constrain options. There will be a mid-term review of the capital plan and this will provide an opportunity to assess progress and consider what scope there is for increased levels of investment depending on economic growth. On that point I am very conscious of the review of the capital plan and of where I come from and our dependence on the road network. As the Senator has said, we do not have rail line connectivity from my county either, and I am very conscious of rural counties, tertiary roads, local roads and all of those roads on which we are so dependent in rural areas in the context of the review.