Denis Naughten (Longford-Roscommon, Fine Gael)
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Question 308: To ask the Minister for Finance the steps he is taking in order that the national development plan is fully implemented in the Border, midland and western region; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [14935/06]

Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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Investments under the National Development Plan — NDP — 2000-2006 are delivered through a number of operational programmes which are directly managed and implemented by Departments, the regional assemblies or other agencies. Each operational programme has a monitoring committee which meets twice yearly to monitor the ongoing implementation of the programme. The managing authorities and the Departments or agencies responsible for implementing specific aspects of the operational programmes have additional procedures in place to monitor and manage the ongoing implementation of the programmes.

The responsibility of my Department is to ensure that funds are made available and allocated in a manner that achieves a sustainable match between spending and resources to meet the Government's objectives and to secure full drawdown of Ireland's allocation of structural funds. In this regard, I have written to my ministerial colleagues asking them to ensure that the investment objectives for the Border, midland and western, BMW, region are appropriately prioritised to ensure a better regional spread of expenditure that will go to achieving the overall aims of the NDP. The most recent monitoring data reported to my Department indicate that, in total, €12 billion was expended in the BMW region under the plan over the period January 2000 to end-December 2005. This represents 76% of total profiled expenditure for the corresponding period.

As well as monitoring the individual operational programmes, my Department chairs the overarching NDP-CSF monitoring committee which meets at least twice yearly. This committee monitors overall progress on the plan and will meet on 25 May 2006, at which stage it will have considered the progress reports of the individual operational programmes for the period January 2000 to end-December 2005.