Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The improvement and maintenance of regional and local roads is the statutory responsibility of each local authority and Exchequer funding is intended to supplement local authorities’ own resources.

In February this year I announced an Exchequer investment of €626million in our regional and local roads across the State which includes an increase in funding of €20million for road pavement and rehabilitation works. The increase in capital funding this year is aimed at offsetting in part the impact of inflation.

As regards the broader funding position, my Department’s capital ceilings are set under the National Development Plan and therefore the scope for additional funding is limited to either identifying opportunities that might exist from year-to-year whereby progress in some programmes and projects might result in funding availability for others at Estimates time, or monitoring in-year expenditure to see if any scope arises for the transfer of funding between programmes. As regards in-year expenditure, the drawdown on capital spending varies from month to month and it is too soon to determine whether any slower than expected drawdowns will lead to a gross capital underspend for the entire year.

Within the budget available for the regional and local road grant programme, the objective is to allocate funding to eligible local authorities on as equitable a basis as possible taking the length of the road network into account. The main focus of the grants continues to be the protection and renewal of the regional and local road network. In this context there has been significant increases in Exchequer grants for regional and local roads particularly in the recent years. The 2023 regional and local road grants were notified to local authorities on 14th February and Wexford County Council has been allocated a total of €22,811,650 which compares to an allocation of €11,642,151 in 2017.

It should be noted that Exchequer funding for regional and local roads is intended to supplement realistic contributions from local authorities’ own resources. As the statutory road authorities for their areas, it is open to local authorities to prioritise investment on regional and local roads.