Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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67. To ask the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the areas it is proposed to allocate the €1.5 billion in extra capital spending set out in the summer economic statement, by Department; and the projects and areas that are being covered. [38126/18]

Paschal Donohoe (Dublin Central, Fine Gael)
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In my role as Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform I am responsible for setting the overall capital allocations across Departments and for monitoring monthly expenditure at a Departmental level.

I do not have a direct role in relation to project selection. Decisions on how Departmental allocations are invested and what projects are selected, are a matter in the first instance for my ministerial colleagues.

I can however inform the Deputy that capital expenditure allocations by Ministerial Vote Group for the years 2018-2022 were published in Annex 1 of the National Development Plan (NDP) and these allocations remain valid.

As detailed in Annex 1 of the NDP, capital expenditure will increase by €1446 million between 2018 and 2019. This is a sizeable increase of approximately 25% between 2018 and 2019. The total capital expenditure allocation for 2019 is €7.3 billion. This increase in capital expenditure is detailed in the table.

This will result in capital expenditure increases across almost every Department. For example, the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government’s capital allocation will increase by approximately €400 million next year, that’s a year-on-year increase of 25%.

The Department of Health’s capital allocation will increase by approximately €174 million next year, a year-on-year increase of 35%.

Details on the projects which this funding is committed to are set out in the NDP as part of a total funding package of €116 billion over the next 10 years. Further details are available from the relevant Departments.

It is important to stress that the increase in capital expenditure which is detailed in the NDP has been structured to underpin the implementation of the National Planning Framework (NPF) and support the development of all counties and regions across Ireland, both urban and rural areas. Aligning our investments to the ten National Strategic Outcomes (NSOs) detailed in the National Planning Framework will help us to ensure that we achieve long-term economic, social and environmental sustainability in the period to 2040.

The NDP includes many new projects and programmes which were not listed in the previous plan which covered the period 2016-2021. For example new projects specifically detailed in the NDP include the M20 Cork to Limerick road, the New Hospital for Cork, BusConnects Programmes for Cork, Dublin and Galway and a major investment programme across the cultural institutions, to name just a small portion of the new investments now planned. While some projects may have been signalled previously, they are now clearly included in the long-term funding framework of the NDP.

In order to increase transparency relating to the details of specific capital projects, a major update of the capital projects tracker will be published in September 2018 on the website of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. This tracker has been compiled with information supplied by Government Departments relating to their own investment plans and is intended to facilitate better coordination and more efficient planning of public infrastructure investment in order to deliver Project Ireland 2040.

The tracker will also inform citizens of the variety of projects currently in the planning and construction phase and to give greater clarity to the construction sector on investment commitments and opportunities.