Kieran O'Donnell (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy D'Arcy, to the Chamber again. This issue is in connection with the mid-term review of the national capital investment plan. It is an issue I feel very strongly about. The review took place in the month of April. More particularly, at that time I held a public information meeting in the Great National South Court Hotel, Raheen, in Limerick city, on Tuesday, 18 April to encourage people to make submissions on the M20, which is the Limerick to Cork motorway. I regard it as the single most important piece of infrastructure Ireland needs. I would go so far as to say that without it, we cannot have balanced regional development. Dublin is bursting at the seams, so to speak. It is doing exceptionally well, but I am of the view that Dublin can only take so much capacity. We are a relatively small island, but if we cannot have motorway connection from Cork to Limerick to Galway, and we cannot get from, say, Cork to Limerick in an hour and Cork to Galway in two hours, we do not have balanced regional development.The existing motorway from Limerick to Cork, in particular from Limerick to Mallow, is impossible to travel on. Anyone who knows it will know about the bottlenecks at Charleville and Buttevant, in particular down by the quarry. This matter is very much to the fore in people's minds, in particular in Limerick but also in Cork and everywhere along the western seaboard, including Galway, because we need to have connection. The Minister of State might indicate how the mid-term capital review is progressing, the anticipated timeframe for the collation of information, and where the M20 stands in this process.

At the start of this year, the Minister, Deputy Shane Ross, agreed to my proposal to allocate €1 million to Transport Infrastructure Ireland, TII, formerly the National Roads Authority, to allow for the recommencement of planning work in respect of the M20. I thank him for that. The allocation has allowed TII to recommence planning, engage consultants and do the pre-planning work required before the main design feature gets under way. As we stand, no further time is being lost. The key element now is to ensure that when the mid-term capital review is complete, we can effectively get the planning and design phase under way for the M20 with immediate effect. We can do it on a staged basis. The part between Limerick and Mallow is the most critical. That is where considerable time is lost. We must ensure that the M20 project is commenced. The mid-term capital review last April was very welcome. There is considerable demand for the project in Limerick. Well over 200 people attended the public consultation meeting I held in the South Court Hotel on Tuesday, 18 April. What people now want to see is action.

The Taoiseach is on record as saying he will look for this to be in place by 2023. That is extremely achievable but on the basis that the M20, the Limerick-Cork motorway, gets the green light under the mid-term capital review. We must see the design, route selection and construction taking place by 2023.