Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour)
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Question 272: To ask the Minister for Transport if, in view of the particularly adverse weather conditions which have been prevailing in the midlands area, including Westmeath, Longford, Offaly and Laois, he will take steps to provide a special allocation of funding to the relevant authorities in these counties to enable them to grit and salt the roads which have been virtually impassable due to the ice and frost conditions pertaining for the past number of weeks and which are expected to continue over Christmas. Local authorities do not have the necessary finance available to enable them to grit and salt these roads, especially some of the secondary and country roads to enable people to travel about their daily business; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46531/08]

Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Roads Act, 1993, the maintenance of roads, including winter maintenance, is a statutory function of each individual road authority. This work is funded out of each authority's own resources, supplemented in the case of regional and local roads by discretionary and block grants allocated annually by my Department. In the case of national roads, funding for maintenance, which includes the gritting of roads and other safety related work in winter, is provided by my Department to the NRA which allocates it among the local authorities.

Local authorities are advised that they should set aside contingency sums from these resources to finance works necessitated by severe weather conditions. In 2008, the total discretionary maintenance grant allocated to county councils by my Department was €29.56 million and the total block grant allocated to urban authorities was €16.133 million. The maintenance grant, including winter maintenance, forecasting and monitoring, by my Department to the NRA for allocation to local authorities in 2008 was €58.21 million. Local authorities are regularly reminded by my Department of their responsibilities in relation to winter maintenance of roads. During 2008, the matter was brought to the attention of local authorities on 5 February and again on 10 December.