Joe McHugh (Donegal North East, Fine Gael)
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Question 215: To ask the Minister for Finance the amount of money spent on capital investment by his Department for each year since 1997 in each of the 26 counties. [35393/08]

Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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Much of the capital expenditure from my Department's vote is IT related rather than geographically specific and accordingly it is not possible to account for all capital expenditure from my Department's vote on a county by county basis. Such expenditure includes e-procurement development, grants under the information society fund, capital grants in aid to the Institute of Public Administration and the Economic and Social research institute.

Capital grants in aid were made from my Department's vote to Ordnance Survey Ireland of €1.978m in 2002, €1.399m in 2003, €1.8m in 2005 and €1m in 2006. Responsibility for Ordnance Survey Ireland moved to the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources in 2007.

The Peace and Northern Ireland Interreg programmes, which are administered by the Special EU Programmes Body, expend capital amounts from my Department's vote on both sides of the border. That office does not compile information on capital expenditure on a county by county basis. The following table sets out the capital outturn for Vote 6 (Office of the Minister for Finance) for each year since 1997 (including 2008 year to date).

In addition, the Civil Service Childcare Initiative which is funded from the Department's vote has commissioned the building of a number of crèches across the State since 2002. The following table sets out capital expenditure by that programme on a county by county basis in the relevant period.

I have been advised by the Revenue Commissioners that the only capital expenditure by Revenue is on computer capital. The spending over the last 10 years is set out in the following table.

Computer capital expenditure covers, in addition to the normal replenishment programme (i.e. where older equipment is no longer capable of running today's business applications or where maintenance costs have become excessive), the acquisition of further hardware and software licences to facilitate business growth, develop new applications and systems which, are required to support Revenue's business requirements. Most of the equipment and software is based in the primary Revenue computer centre and the backup computer centre, both of which are located in Dublin. The remaining equipment comprising of mainly PCs and associated software is installed in Revenue offices throughout the country.

The Valuation Office, the Commission for Public Service Appointment, the Office of the Ombudsman, the Office of the Comptroller & Auditor General, the State Laboratory and the Public Appointments Service fall under the aegis of my Department. In the period in question they had either no capital expenditure or very small capital subheads from which there was no geographically specific expenditure.

The following table sets out total capital expenditure by the Office of Public Works from its vote. However, in the time available to answer the question, the Office of Public Works was unable to compile the information on a county by county basis. The information will be compiled and forwarded by that Office to the Deputy as soon as possible.