I do not have a specific update here with me on digital or electronic health records. We have taken the leap as a Government, with the Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, to put significant capital funding aside to digitalise our health system, which is the correct strategic move in the context of Ireland being behind many other countries in the efficient use of health data for personal reasons and for patient records. There is huge duplication across our hospital system with paper records. There is a tender process…

Certainly there is a massive opportunity in terms of data as we digitalise our health system. We need to do it in a way that builds trust, is transparent and obviously protects individuals as well. I would be open to that wider engagement with the Minister for Health and others, as we are tendering for this and delivering it, on how do we build the case so that people can use really important data to deliver better clinical research, and how people's personal health records can provide a huge capacity in the contex…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 8 and 21 together. As part of the budgetary process each year, my Department sets overall expenditure ceilings for each ministerial Vote group. These are laid out at Vote level in the budget day expenditure report published in October, with further detail provided in the Revised Estimates for public services published in December. Following the allocation of each ministerial expenditure ceiling, it is a matter for each Minister to assign funding as appropriate at programme and subhe…

I am not privy to the interaction the Deputy had with the Minister for housing on this, but the Local Government Fund distributes the respective funding across different local authorities, and Galway County Council and Galway City Council would receive allocations through that. I was clear in my initial response to Deputy O'Hara. We have significant investment across many projects in the west of Ireland for water and wastewater treatment, which is required to build new homes. There is also the investment that ESB a…

As Minister, I am responsible for the setting the overall capital allocations across Departments and for monitoring monthly expenditure at departmental level. In 2021, the NDP review originally committed €165 billion for the period to 2030. The revised development plan set out €275.4 billion in capital investment to 2035, the largest and most significant capital investment in the history of the State, and gross capital expenditure ceilings for all sectors have now been set. In addition to the €275 billion, we have …

The published tracker sets out the region-by-region specificity in terms of infrastructure investment. I understand and agree that we need to give that regional uplift to the north-west, where there is a documented infrastructure deficit. That is why we have prioritised transport in our national development plan and, in fairness, the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, has rebalanced some of the transport funding so that many of the roads projects that were delayed in the previous Government can progress where there have bee…

The Deputy and I were in Ballymote last summer, and I am very familiar with the wider territory of Sligo and the north-west, including that great county, Mayo, next door to the Deputy, where I was last weekend.

We recognise the need, whether in north-west Donegal, where I was a few weeks ago, or all the way down to Kerry. There is a need along the Atlantic corridor to give that uplift to investment in roads and to enhance Local Link. I will ask the National Transport Authority to engage with the Deputy on that. There are also huge opportunities in tourism. Where we build out the tourism infrastructure, people come in their droves. We have seen that in many parts of the west, where trails, greenways, blueways and various p…

In December 2025, the Government published the medium-term fiscal and structural plan, which set out fixed expenditure ceilings for the period 2026 to 2030. This provides for significant uplifts in expenditure over the coming years, with gross voted spending to reach €147.3 billion in 2030. My Department has responsibility for developing expenditure policy in line with agreed Government objectives, including adhering to the expenditure ceilings set out in the plan. My Department establishes the governance framework…

That is why we should have reforms in the Department of Education and Youth around how that operates more efficiently. It is the role of the Minister and Accounting Officer in that Department, to use that example in terms of efficiency in respect of school transport, to ensure that we do not have duplication or two half-empty buses when there could be one. That is something that should be examined by the Department of Education and Youth to drive value for money. We have been clear in the value for money obligation…

We want to digitalise our public services, drive efficiencies and advance reforms, and that is a necessity. In everything we are doing in the escalation framework and implementing cost controls in respect of Departments, it is all about efficiency, how we improve productivity, digitalise more and, ultimately, build better public services for people who want to see them improve. People want to see the endpoint of the increased expenditure the Deputy referenced to ensure that the outputs improve and the impacts are b…

The Critical Infrastructure Act 2026 provides a statutory basis for the acceleration of decision-making regarding projects and programmes that are designated as critical infrastructure. The Act requires that all reasonable steps be taken by public bodies, individually and collectively, to progress any functions that they may have in regard to these projects and programmes as quickly as possible. Section 1 of the Act specifically highlights transport, energy and water infrastructure in the definition of infrastructu…

I appreciate all of Deputy Neville's inputs on the wider reforms we have advanced. We expect to have an initial designation for a small number of projects and will then set out a process around how that will happen. The focus is on the projects that can benefit from an immediate designation and how they can be accelerated quickly. Some projects are on lists and going through particular processes, but are not necessarily ready for designation. That process is concluding for a small number of projects that will benef…

I absolutely agree. It is about the cumulative impact of all the reforms, including cutting out some of the process at the earlier stage, the external insurance process, which saved half a year, and some of the regulatory reforms we have introduced, with a 30% time saving under the Maritime Area Regulatory Authority, for example, for marine licensing. The wider regulatory reforms ensure we have a better balance in terms of the legal system, including in respect of judicial reviews and the environmental legal fees c…

As Minister, I am responsible for setting the overall capital allocations across Departments and monitoring monthly expenditure at departmental level. The NDP review was published in July last year, with Departments subsequently publishing sectoral investment plans setting out the capital projects to be prioritised out to 2030. Furthermore, the Accelerating Infrastructure Report and Action Plan, which was published in December 2025, outlined a range of reforms to speed up delivery of critical infrastructure across …

We have been clear about the absolute necessity to protect the huge ecosystem of digital and infrastructure investment in Ireland over the past ten to 20 years. Part of that has been the wider and ongoing discussion on the security of subsea cables. In terms of our immediate capital plans, the Department of communications, when it comes to digital infrastructure, has been prioritising the nationwide roll-out of the national broadband plan, particularly in terms of rural broadband and connectivity. Any longer-term a…

This is a pro-enterprise Government that wants to grow our economy. Critical to that is our airport and port capacity. Dublin Port's masterplan drives increased port capacity out to 2040. There is a separate wider discussion on additional east coast capacity, which I think we will require in the medium to long term in addition to Dublin Port, the capacity of which will be constrained. We need to drive its infrastructure plan efficiently. There have been constraints and planning complexity at Dublin Airport in recen…

I will not tell the Deputy again about how I am responsible for setting the overall capital allocations, as outlined in the reply in front of me. I will proceed instead to address the question itself, which is about NSO No. 4. This objective is about investing in high-quality sustainable transport and mobility to improve quality of life for all our citizens, support our transition to a low-carbon society and enhance our economic competitiveness. The Department of Transport published the national investment framewor…

I appreciate the Deputy's advocacy and input on the DART+ and DART+ South West programmes. We want to deliver many of these projects over the next number of years. That is why the continued uplift of transport investment is essential. On a positive note, we are seeing many of these projects move out of the planning system now to allow us to move to procurement for BusConnects and DART+. The Deputy referenced the importance of delivering this low-carbon transport in terms of housing supply and ensuring that a lot of…

I agree. BusConnects should continue to evolve, particularly with increased development in parts of west Dublin and elsewhere. It should future-proof development as it is occurring. I support the Deputy on that. The NTA needs to be developing that real-time adjustment to BusConnects so that we future-proof our bus system for residential development, which is being built out in certain areas. The NTA needs to prioritise that. We should not leave any new community islanded without bus connectivity. BusConnects needs …