Ceisteanna ó na Comhaltaí Eile - Other Members’ Questions Dail Éireann — 2026-04-16 ============================================================ Simon Harris (FG), Wicklow I thank the Deputy very much for her questions. I know from our engagement to date on a variety of issues and her own professional background that she is data driven in terms of the questions that puts down in this House and, indeed, in the discussions that we had around the programme for Government. I thank her for that because what she is raising today, as she rightly said, is a commitment in the programme for Government. I will ask the Minister, Deputy Chamber, as the Minister with responsibility in this area regarding the unit for future planning, because it will be based in the Department of public expenditure and reform, to engage directly with the Deputy to make sure that we get her the most up-to-date information about where that unit is and when it will be established. I am told that the work is now ongoing through a unit for future planning. There is a unit there across a number of key areas. The purpose of the unit is to look at how we can integrate long-term strategic planning more systemically into policy-making in line with the policy document - better public services. So far, the work has not got to the point that the Deputy is rightly raising here. It would be useful if it could in terms of that county-by-county basis because it is not. Even in a country the size of Ireland, some of the issues are common but there can also be very significant differentials. The housing example Deputy Gogarty gave us is an example of that too. In some parts of the country, we are seeing a very significant number of new homes and in others, not nearly the levels that we need. We are engaging now on work to try to strengthen long-term planning right across the Government. The unit for future planning with the Minister, Deputy Chambers, is an example of that. There are also other examples. The decision that we took to publish a medium-term expenditure framework to effectively outline what levels of spending we have, not just for today or tomorrow, this year or the next budget, but out for five years on capital and current is quite important. That framework is based on analysis of past trends. The piece of work I am most proud of - it gets a bit of talk in here but not enough - is Future Forty. It is a really good piece of work done by officials in the Department of Finance. It looks ahead at demographic, technological, social and environmental trends. It basically says that if Ireland did not do anything in terms of policy and we were operating on a no change policy basis, what would our country look like by 2040? It is the antidote to short-termism. We are having a Cabinet committee on this very shortly. It will be discussed at the National Economic Dialogue. How we embed that treasure trove of information systemically in public policy, not just for the Government but everyone in the Oireachtas, agencies and State agencies is an important point. The national development plan has €275.4 billion set out in public capital investment until 2035. This is beyond the lifetime of this Dáil. This again gives agencies an ability to respond beyond the short term. I did not get a chance to come back on childcare and school places but I will in my next contribution. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-16/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:49+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-04-16