2025-12-16

I move: "That the Bill be now read a second time." I am pleased to introduce the Appropriation Bill. The Bill is an important annual financial legislative instrument which must be enacted before the end of the year in order to give effect to the authorisation of voted expenditure through 2025 and to allow for the continuation of expenditure into 2026. The Bill has two primary functions. The first is to provide legal authorisation for all the expenditure that occurred in 2025 on the basis of the Estimates voted on by the Dáil over the year. These allocations are known as the amounts to be appropriated for the supply of services. They are set out in section 2 and Schedule 1. They relate to the Revised Estimates, Further Revised Estimates and Supplementary Estimates that have been agreed by the Dáil over the course of 2025. In net terms, these Estimates amount to €91.5 billion. In gross terms and taking into account expenditure on the Social Insurance Fund and National Training Fund, total gross voted expenditure allocated for this year is €109.9 billion. This reflects the Government's investment in public services, delivering on the priorities we set out in budget 2025, including higher weekly social protection payments, targeted investments in areas such as health and transformational investment in infrastructure to unlock growth, enhance competitiveness and support communities all over the country under the revised national development plan. Our social protection system seeks to provide an effective social safety net for the more vulnerable members of our society. When expenditure on the Social Insurance Fund is included, the 2025 gross expenditure allocation for social protection is over €27.5 billion. Funding provided in 2025 enabled improvements to the social welfare system for people on a range of income supports as well as providing additional support for families and people on illness, disability and carer programmes. Funding in 2025 delivered increases in core weekly social welfare rates, which increased the income of an estimated 1.45 million recipients, increases to the child support payment and working family payment income thresholds, an increase in the domiciliary care allowance rate, and a range of other measures. Significant investment in the health service, with the allocation for health in 2025 reaching €26.1 billion, continues a trend of substantial resourcing in recent years. It underscores the Government’s commitment to ensuring that the healthcare needs of our population can continue to be met in a complex and challenging environment. Ireland achieves good health outcomes across a number of indicators. Over the past decade, Ireland has achieved an improvement in life expectancy. Improvements in the overall health of the population have resulted in significant declines in our mortality rates for many of the common causes of death over the past decade. There have been significant expansions in eligibility for schemes including the free contraception scheme. There have also been women’s health initiatives and the abolition of inpatient charges for public patients. Housing has seen a strong ramp-up in delivery on both the social and affordable programmes. In 2024, 10,500 new social homes were delivered and there is a continued delivery pipeline for 2025 and future years. A total of €9.7 billion in funding is being provided this year for the housing, local government and heritage Vote group. This includes close to €6 billion in capital funding. The significant level of capital investment will continue under the revised national development plan, with almost €40 billion committed over the period to 2030 to support housing delivery and water infrastructure. Education funding in 2025 provided an appropriate school place to over 975,000 students in primary, post-primary and special schools around the country. This is alongside a record number of teachers, with approximately 78,000 employed by the Department of Education and Youth. Close to 700 new teachers were employed in September 2025 for the commencement of the 2025-26 school year. To support the education of students with special education needs, over 400 new special classes were sanctioned for this school year, bringing the total number of special classes to over 3,700. Education capital expenditure in 2025 is supporting the continued progression of around 300 building projects currently at construction. The 2025 funding has also enabled a range of other schemes and initiatives across government. In further and higher education, 2025 funding continues to invest for our future and to meet the skills needs of the labour market. Investment in 2025 provided funding for the increased delivery of apprenticeships, supporting skills development in key areas for the economy such as housing and climate action. At €1.35 billion, investment in early learning and childcare reached record levels in 2025. National childcare scheme universal subsidies are worth up to €5,000 per child in 2025. In addition, the access and inclusion model is now supporting more than 8,000 children with a disability to access childcare. Budget 2026 will continue to see early learning and school-age care prioritised, with an increase in the allocation of 10%. This will support affordability measures including further reductions in the maximum level of fees and increases to the income-assessed thresholds on the NCS. Increased capital funding through the NDP will seek to improve accessibility in the sector. A balanced approach to public service pay in the context of both the State's fiscal position and the broader economic environment was achieved by the Public Service Agreement 2024-2026. Multiyear public service agreements have contributed to stability within our economy by facilitating the delivery of quality public services, ongoing reforms and the maintenance of industrial peace in the public service. The second principal function of the Bill is to provide a legal basis for expenditure to continue into next year in the period before the Dáil votes on the 2026 Estimates. As set out in the Central Fund (Permanent Provisions) Act 1965, the authority for spending in 2026, prior to the agreement of the 2026 Estimates by the Dáil, is based on the amounts included in this Bill. For this reason, it is essential that it be enacted before the end of 2025. Should the Bill not be enacted, there would be no authority to spend any voted moneys in 2026 from the start of January until the approval of the 2026 Estimates. To account for the complexity faced by Departments in planning for major capital projects, the rolling multi-annual capital envelopes introduced in 2004 allow for the carryover of up to 10% of unspent voted capital expenditure from the current year into the next year. This provides the degree of flexibility needed for the year-on-year planning of capital expenditure. Schedule 2 of the Bill sets out the proposed capital expenditure amounts that are to be carried over to 2026 by Vote. The total level of capital carryover sought from 2025 into 2026 is €182.25 million. The carryover figure is on a downward trajectory from the amounts requested by Departments in recent years. I am pleased that the strong performance of capital expenditure this year reflects significant improvements in capital project delivery throughout the country. This continued investment is providing housing, school buildings and transport infrastructure for all our citizens, building capacity for our future. The Revised Estimates Volume 2026, which will be published by my Department in December, will include details of the amounts to be deferred by subhead for Votes that are availing of the capital carryover function for next year. As in previous years, the Appropriation Bill also provides a provision for repayable advances from the Central Fund to the Paymaster General’s supply account to meet certain 2026 Exchequer liabilities due for payment over the first week of January, such as payroll and pension payments. The provision for these advances is critical as the banking system will be closed on Thursday, 1 January. This means that it is necessary for the funding to be in place in departmental bank accounts before the end of this year to meet those liabilities on a timely basis. This Bill also provides provision to prefund certain payments under the Social Welfare Acts due between 1 January and 6 January 2026 that are made on an agency basis by An Post. The advances provision in the Bill ensures that these payments can be transferred from the Department of Social Protection to the network of An Post offices throughout the country. Section 3 provides for up to €1.2 billion to be advanced from the Central Fund to meet these requirements. This is a higher amount than in recent years due to payroll dates in early 2026. This is a technical provision and any advances will be repaid to the Central Fund in January 2026. The Bill is an essential element of housekeeping undertaken by the Dáil each year. The passage of this Bill will authorise in law all of the expenditure that has taken place in 2025 on the basis of the Estimates voted on by the Dáil over the course of this year. It also provides authority for voted expenditure to continue in the period between the beginning of January 2026 and when the Dáil approves the 2026 Estimates. This will ensure the continued funding for the delivery of front-line public services, including our health and education services, social protection payments, funding for An Garda Síochána and much more. It reflects a continuation of our planned approach to public spending, which is focused on delivering our economic, social, and climate ambitions and supporting a growing population now and into the future.

Gabhaim buíochas leis na hAirí as teacht os comhair na Dála ar an gceist seo. Ar ndóigh, tuigim gur Bille fíorthábhachtach é seo chun a chinntiú gur féidir le Ranna Rialtais airgead a chaitheamh ag tús Mhí Eanáir agus nach mbeidh vótaí ag teastáil chun é sin a dhéanamh. Mar gheall air sin, tuigimid an tábhacht a bhaineann leis. Tá bunús bunreachtúil leis an mBille seo agus, mar sin, beimid i Sinn Féin ag tacú leis. I understand there is a constitutional requirement for this Bill as it legislates for the financial resolutions, which include all of the Estimates agreed by the Dáil this year. The sums granted from the Central Fund under the Central Fund (Permanent Provisions) Act 1965 will go towards making good the supply grant and amount, in the aggregate, to the sum of €91 billion. The key to this Bill is that it is a constitutional requirement and is essential to ensure Departments can spend money come January. We will therefore support the Bill. The Bill also allows for the four-fifths rule provided for under the Central Fund (Permanent Provisions) Act. This means Departments can spend four fifths of what was allowed under the previous Appropriation Act without the need for a vote. If the Bill was not enacted, these Departments could not spend. The Bill also allows for capital carryover. As per the Finance Act 2004, each Department can carry over 10% of its capital allocation to next year. The deferred surrender relating to capital supply services this year totals €182 million. The spending of these funds will be key to tackling the big issues of the day. For many years, there was no debate on these Bills. It is welcome and important that we are now debating this particular Bill because there is a very serious aspect to it. Over the years, when we have discussed these Bills, one of the issues I have always raised is the matter of our infrastructural deficit and the fact that, for years, we have had the IMF, OECD and others telling us we had such a deficit. One of the issues I have always raised is that, when we look at capital expenditure, we must attempt to alleviate that infrastructural deficit. As I said to the Minister during oral questions last week, I really do wish him the best in that regard because this State and the people living within it and within our communities can no longer deal with the lack of infrastructure they are facing. I will start, when we are talking about that, with housing. Mar is eol don Aire, rud atá ráite agus luaite agam go minic leis ná go bhfuil fadhb againn nuair nach bhfuil an buninfreastruchtúr i gceantar agus mar gheall air sin nach bhfuil na suíomhanna leis na seirbhísí ann chun tithe a thógáil. Má bhreathnaímid ar Chonamara mar shampla, tá a fhios againn i ndeisceart Chonamara nach bhfuil an talamh ná na suíomhanna ag an gcomhairle contae chun a chinntiú go bhfuil sí in ann tithe a thógáil ar na suíomhanna sin mar gheall nach bhfuil na bunseirbhísí ann. Tá impleachtaí aige sin ar chuile shórt, ach go háirithe orthu siúd ar fad atá ag iarraidh bheith in ann cónaí sa cheantar arb as dóibh, rud nach féidir leo a dhéanamh faoi láthair mar gheall nach féidir teach a thógáil, a cheannach nó a fháil ar cíos i gConamara. Mar gheall air sin, tá tábhacht ag baint leis an mBille seo agus go n-úsáidfear an t-airgead sin chun an infheistiú sin a dhéanamh. When talking about housing, as I mentioned relating to Conamara but also Galway city, we have had the issue of lack of wastewater infrastructure on the east side of Galway city where I live, and the impact that has had on na nArdán. That is why Bills like these are quite important because they have a direct impact. We need to see all that, what I would call basic, fundamental infrastructure, be developed to ensure that housing can be built on the east side of Galway city. Too many people who are born and raised in Galway city can no longer live in it because of the lack of housing. Then, we can look at the likes of the other basic infrastructure I have raised over the years when we were discussing this and talking about the importance of us having a full infrastructure plan. I understand the Minister is working on that and is hoping to progress it. I wish him well on that but because we have had decades of neglect in this region, there are serious implications. For example, extra services out of Oranmore train station are extremely welcome. The passing loop is extremely welcome but the fact that at the same time additional parking spaces have not been created, or they will not be prepared in time for the passing loop, means there is then an issue whereby if we do not have the infrastructure there, as sometimes one hand is not talking to the other, it will result in additional pressures. We already know the impact there. Oranmore train station is always packed out with cars. We then have additional stops that are crucially needed to ensure better public transport in Galway city. I refer to the likes of having an additional stop at Roscam to serve the people in the east side of Galway city, from Doughiska to Roscam, who could just dander down to a place like that if it was there. Park and ride has been talked about for years but again there has been an issue with the development of sites. When we have historically not looked at putting the investment into our basic infrastructure, these are the real-life impacts that has. Tuigeann an tAire go maith na deacrachtaí atá ann leis na bóithre, i gConamara ach go háirithe, agus an easpa infheistíochta a rinneadh iontu le fada an lá. Anois, tá fadhb againn nach mbíonn an t-airgead ar fáil don chomhairle contae chun déileáil leo seo. Tuigim an tábhacht a bhaineann leis an mBille ionas go mbeidh na Ranna éagsúla in ann airgead a chaitheamh i mí Eanáir ach caithfimid breathnú ar an mbealach ina bhfuil airgead á chaitheamh agus cinntiú go bhfuil an t-airgead ann dá leithéidí sin freisin. I will leave it at that as I am sharing time with my colleagues.

Constitutionally required, a key provision of this Bill relates to capital carryovers. This allows Departments to carry over allocated but unspent capital funding this year. That is straightforward enough. However, a cause of frustration is equally straightforward and that is the question of why. We immediately know that these funds are going unspent because one of the Minister's ministerial colleagues managed to deliver to some works early or under budget. It was the Minister for Finance who oversaw the signing of a contract for the national children's hospital. There have been 16 missed completion deadlines and it is running to around three times the initial estimated cost. While the Government today looks at the capital carryover, the country remains awash with underfunded infrastructure projects in desperate need of Government support. Nowhere is this more so than in the case of the north-west and Border regions. In my own constituency of Cavan-Monaghan, there are a number of such projects with the potential to have a profound impact on communities. Two are the N2 Clontibret to the Border and the N2 Ardee to Castleblayney road projects. I reiterate my welcoming of the shared island funding for works on the A5 in the North, which complements both of these projects. However, the overall benefits accrued can only maximised if works being completed on this side of the Border are actually carried out. The N2 upgrades have potential to play a crucial part in the unlocking of the economic potential of the region. However, these projects have not seen the prioritisation needed from the Government. Works were effectively suspended under the previous Government due to a lack of funding. While the Minister can dispute that if he wishes, "suspended" is the language used by Transport Infrastructure Ireland, TII, yet, its project appraisal balance sheet for this project scored these works the highest possible score for the impact they would have on safety. Following the tragic events of the last weekend, where four people were killed in separate collisions over a 24-hour period, the number of people killed on our roads in this State this year to date is 179, a figure which has surpassed that of last year. This is a crisis level of collisions. I support the Government target of reducing road fatalities to zero by 2050 but we need increased funding for education and communication in the Road Safety Authority and the Garda roads policing resources. We also need capital investment to progress projects that will have an impact on safety, and the funding of these projects in Monaghan can play a part in that in our region. Another area where our Government woefully failed to manage a budget is in relation to carbon tax allocations. In that case, we are not even talking about carryover. Having promised farmers that they would receive €1.5 billion from carbon tax by 2030, in addition to the CAP, halfway through 2030 what has materialised? Not half, not even 10%, just €110 million of the promised €1.15 billion. Of that €110 million, what was the Government's track record? More than half went unspent and was returned to the Exchequer, with just €4 million carried over in the manner we are dealing with today. In January, the Government will increase the cost of petrol and diesel through a hiked carbon tax. The Minister cannot tax people into using public transport options that are not reliable and are simply not there; they do not exist. He cannot credibly continue to mislead farmers promising billions of euro while delivering a meagre fraction. Real vision from the Government is needed. A vision for decarbonisation, economic development in the Border region and north west and increased use of public transportation will not be delivered through carbon tax. What the people of Monaghan and Cavan need is infrastructure and services, not hectoring or lectures and certainly not capital surrenders while the Government fails to fund the infrastructure our communities need. I ask the Government to consider its carbon tax increases, penalisation of the farmers and an abysmal track record of infrastructure in the Border region.

Is Bille cuíosach teicniúil é seo i slí amháin. Tagann sé os ár gcomhair gach bliain, ach is le déanaí a thosaigh díospóireacht air. Nuair a bhí mise tofa ar dtús, bhíodh sé rite tríd gan aon díospóireachta in aon chor ag deireadh na bliana. Tá sé go maith go bhfuil an díospóireacht ann i slí amháin. Sa deireadh thiar thall, níor chuala mé aon rud riamh sna díospóireachtaí seo a thug le fios go dtiocfadh aon athrú an mBille bliantúil seo, nó go n-athrófar an slí a dtabharfaimid faoi seo in aon bhliain amach anseo. Tá muid ag díriú isteach ar cheisteanna móra agus caiteachas an-mhór ó thaobh an Stáit de. Is é sin an fáth a bhfuil fonn ar dhaoine a bheith ag déanamh díospóireachta air seo. Chuile bhliain, feiceann muid ar na ceisteanna atá ardaithe anseo. De ghnáth, áfach, bíonn reachtaíocht ann maidir le ceisteanna leasa sóisialta. Tar éis an bhuiséid, de ghnáth, tagann Bille leasa shóisialaigh os ár gcomhair chun na hathraithe atá ag teacht ón bhuiséad a chur i ndlí. Ní bheidh sé sin rite i mbliana roimh an Nollaig. Níl a fhios agam cé acu an athrú poirt nó cinneadh a bhí ann toisc an slí a raibh an buiséad rite. Questions need to be asked every single year in regard to how we fund our public services. One of those questions relates to the Defence Forces because the State has to set aside a certain amount to meet the established membership figure the forces are supposed to achieve. That number used to be 12,500 and was then reduced to 9,500. Every year, the money is set aside in the hope, or perhaps the dream, that we will reach that magical number. At the moment, we are 2,000 short of the magical number of 9,500. There are not enough people in any of the sections of the Defence Forces, whether an Cabhlach, the military or the Air Corps. They cannot provide services as an aid to the State at the rate we would like them to be able to do. That is no criticism of the men and women of the Defence Forces. It is just a fact of life and everything has to be tweaked accordingly. The men and women of the Defence Forces are under huge pressure to ensure they deliver extra overtime even though they do not get paid for any such overtime they do to fill in on the jobs that are meant to be done. We know this from some of the headlines during the year and it seems we will face the same situation next year because of the lack of equipment and, in particular, the lack of personnel. There was a lot of talk in the media in recent weeks about the additional costs and additional security required for the meetings that will be held in Ireland during our Presidency of the EU in the second half of next year. I am assured by the members of the Defence Forces to whom I have spoken that they will do what is required to ensure there is not any disruption to what is planned. However, unless we get real, that will take its toll on the Defence Forces. Even the recent announcement about capital spend on material does not address some of the shortfalls, including the continuous loss of personnel to the private sector or to other types of jobs. We must take seriously the need to increase the Defence Forces numbers, increase the equipment they have and identify the threats faced by the State, of which there have been a number over the years. The Defence Forces have not been provided with the equipment that could be used for defence purposes and as an aid to the civil power. Recently, the headlines have focused on the issue of drones. Anyone looking at the world in the past ten years will understand that drone technology is where it is, yet the Defence Forces have not caught up because they have not been given the funding to do so. The same is true of the Naval Service and the job of work it must do to defend our fishing industry, our coastline and, additionally, to defend cables under the seas, for which all the onus seems to be on us. That cannot be done unless we have the personnel, fleet and wherewithal to do it. It is good that there has at least been some type of acknowledgement of that in recent years. It means the funding must be spent when it is there. There are other areas we need to look at. Housing was mentioned by my colleagues. There is also the case of the national children's hospital, which features year on year in these debates. The Bill sets out what we are spending and it is not working in terms of the national children's hospital because we still have not shifted everybody over there, as should have happened at this stage. It should have been opened several years ago if the Government had taken the proper tack. That was not to be and we still do not know whether it will open next year. We hope it will, at long last, and that local residents will have peace and quiet after the alarms have been going off in the hospital on an ongoing basis in recent weeks. I asked the Minister last week in the Chamber about the arts centre in the north inner city that is facing eviction on 14 January unless the State steps in and helps the people running the service with a capital injection to enable them to acquire the property and continue operating this important and eclectic arts centre. It is not a huge amount in the bigger scheme of things. The Government has proposed setting up some type of arts capital scheme based on the sports capital schemes. We would welcome if the Minister or some other Minister would take the opportunity this week to set out that the Government is fully behind the proposals for the arts centre and at least to get the landlord to back off and give the people running the centre some time. Dublin City Council has agreed to step in to part-fund the proposal to purchase the complex and for it to continue to be run as an arts centre. Tá a lán eile, mar a dúirt mé, maidir le tithíocht, agus tithíocht na Gaeltachta go háirithe. Luaigh mo chomhghleacaí, an Teachta Mairéad Farrell, a lán de sin. Tá súil agam go mbeidh muid in ann teacht go dtí an Bille seo ag deireadh na bliana seo chugainn agus an infheistíocht cheart déanta.

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill. I recall the rushed nature of the debate on the corresponding Bill on the eve of the general election last November. As has been said on many occasions over the years, this legislation is, to some degree, a housekeeping exercise, as reflected in the Minister's comments, but it is nevertheless important that we have a Dáil debate on the matters the Bill addresses more broadly. As previous speakers noted, it was not that not long ago that the Dáil did not debate appropriations of this nature at all, with annual appropriations simply being nodded through. Our consideration of the Appropriation Bill allows us to take stock and think for a minute about the direction of public spending and how and why we allocate resources. That is the very essence of politics. Constitutionally, it is our job as Members of the Dáil to do so. There are few measures contained in the Bill that anyone will disagree with and nobody has any issue whatsoever with the Bill going through. I hope I speak for everyone in opposition on that count. It will ensure moneys are available into early next year to pay public servants, keep services going and provide for the carryover, within reason, of capital, accepting the complex and multi-annual nature of important capital projects. It will also ensure core social welfare payments are made seamlessly at the beginning of the new year. On the capital side, we ought to have a Dáil debate on our return in January on the recently published Accelerating Infrastructure plan. Such a debate has not yet happened. We in the Labour Party have given the general approach of the plan a measured and calibrated welcome, with some caveats in relation to what we view as dangerous limitations being placed on the right of citizens in this Republic to access what we might term environmental justice and to have access to the courts on important matters of justice and rights. Such is the dire situation with the delivery of housing, offshore energy, transport projects and so on, which are key to our economic performance and the success of our society, that any plan that envisages a new mission-orientated approach should be given a chance. Ministers and senior officials seem prepared to be accountable - in the truest sense of the word - for failure. A plan should be given a chance to prove its worth and value. We care about the future of the country, and we will not play opportunistic politics with a plan of this nature, but we will relentlessly hold the Government to account on any slippage and on any failures. This is far too serious a plan and far too serious a situation for us not to do that. To a degree, this kind of debate is almost at odds with the growing pattern evident in recent years of the weakening of the transparency framework around framing budgets and indeed the presentation and debating of spending plans, annual Estimates and Supplementary Estimates. This year the Dáil has been expected to approve, on the nod, Supplementary Estimates totalling around €4 billion. While this might be down on last year's figure, it is still an extraordinary ask of our National Parliament. The bizarre thing is that there is little or no real debate in this Chamber or in the line committees on the nature of the requests from Ministers for extra allocations. This has become an-all-too-frequent occurrence and now an almost routine part of the annual budgetary process. That this is the case raises very serious questions about how we do the people's business. It would be useful to have access to the Revised Estimates for 2026 in advance of a debate of this nature, so we can look at spending on a multi-annual basis in the round and make some comparisons. It is worth reminding ourselves that it is the constitutional function of TDs and the Dáil collectively to scrutinise Estimates, to amend and pass the annual budget and to hold the Executive to account. The reality is that the Executive sees the Dáil merely as a rubber-stamping Chamber. This is bad for our democracy and for the principle of good fiscal management. This year again, we were asked to nod through substantial Supplementary Estimates that are cumulatively the equivalent of the amount of revenue raised in corporation tax in any one year just over a decade ago. This puts the position we are in into some kind of context. Whether Ministers have the will to stay within the tramlines next year is an open question. We have a situation now in Ireland where budgets, as I have said repeatedly, have become works of fiction as Ministers have shown themselves incapable of responsibly controlling spending and staying within the confines of the sizeable allocations announced 13 or 14 months prior. We know for example that this year's budget saw total spending up by 12% on the 2025 Estimates. In budget 2026, we saw the largest allocation of public money ever, beating last year's record. That is required to meet the social and economic demands of a growing country, and the growing demands of the populace. It was a budget of over €9 billion, comfortably beating the last one, yet working people are still likely to be worse off than they were, largely thanks to decisions made on wasteful tax cuts brought in at the behest of noisy lobbyists. Responsible budgeting does not mean cuts. There should be no confusion about this. We can have responsible fiscal management and social and economic progress, imagination and innovation at the same time. They are not mutually exclusive. It is not a zero-sum game. I have said time and again that we cannot spend more and cut taxes at the same time, put that approach on a continuous rinse-and-repeat cycle, and expect an outcome that does not prove to be negative in the end. That is all at the same time as our tax base is at mortal risk. Given what we have seen in the last few budgets, Paschal was not prudent, and with his signature VAT cut for the burger barons, neither was Simon as sensible as the moniker he has given himself suggests. The Dáil needs to exercise its rights and constitutional functions when it comes to accountability for our public spending. This is precisely why I will shortly be publishing legislation to establish an office of an Estimates commissioner, which will greatly enhance the capacity and function of the Dáil to keep the Government honest on its in-year spending plans. There is a worrying opaqueness about how we allocate resources, and how we plan. Time and again, I have criticised the opacity around the presentation of the cost, for example, of maintaining existing levels of service, ELS. This is not an abstract point. It goes to the heart of the budgetary process. It suits the Government to be less than clear about what it costs to maintain basic levels of health, education and spending on other services, so it can juggle with the numbers, make itself look more responsible than it is, or alternatively pull some rabbits out of hats on or near budget day. For years, we have all been working on the basis that the summer economic statement was the gospel, published well ahead of the October budget, allowing for clear data on ELS for the subsequent year, and making it clear as well what fiscal space was available, on a more or less no-policy-change basis – in other words, what would be available for extra spending and additional tax-cutting measures when everything else is accounted for to keep the show on the road and meet evolving demographic needs. Clear data and better Dáil scrutiny of the data and figures would also help to keep the Opposition honest. It is not just about keeping the Government honest but about having an informed debate in this House on agreed numbers. The post-budget analysis of the Parliamentary Budget Office, PBO, does not pull any punches. For this year's budget, it says "there is a noticeable absence of transparent, data-driven analysis to underpin fiscal decisions." It also states there is "now no separation between the allocation given for new measures and funding required to maintain ELS, with the exception of the pay deal impact and carryover costs." Again this is not in any way an academic point, as it makes it difficult for all of us to conclude if the spending we are doing for this year and next year will in fact keep the show on the road at all. Will it help us to meet the challenges we have? Do we need more or less? What is the objective situation? It is hard to be definitive. Similarly, there are criticisms of what is termed the weak evidence base to inform some decisions contained in the PBO's analysis. For example, not all pledged tax expenditure reviews were published. We are also reminded that there have been no spending review papers published for 2025. This is really unforgivable in the current environment and it needs to change fast. Never before have we spent more as a country, yet there is an evident frustration that I have not seen for some time, if at all, about how the country simply is not working in a way that a rich country should. We are used to seeing Ireland as a two-tier country, but in my experience in recent times a three-tier Ireland is emerging. We are speaking about the Appropriation Bill, which in general terms is about spending and the allocation of resources. We need to be clear that the frayed social contract can only be repaired if we get better at generating and allocating the resources we need to make sure that everyone feels they have a stake in this evermore complex society. I will explain what I mean when I talk about a three-tier society. The resources of the top 10% of asset owners and income earners mean they have only heard mere talk of a cost-of-living and housing crisis. It has never visited their door. We have a cohort of people where the idea of a cost-of-living crisis now has a real permanence in their lives, and where the State needs to offer a better, more hopeful future for them and their children, as their prospect of progress seems more remote from their reality with every passing day. Then we have people on middle incomes, many of whom I have never seen as angry and frustrated as they are now. They see an economy that is objectively doing well but they do not feel that is the case for themselves. That is not their own experience. They are dealing with what I might term broken promises on reducing childcare costs. We will see what the Government publishes tomorrow in its childcare plan. People spend endless hours in cars driving from a home that is some distance from where they want to live to jobs where the salary would ordinarily have guaranteed them a good life, but now it does not. Instead of tax cuts and once-off payments to lessen the blow, it is affordable homes and decent universal public services - the kind which their peers in other wealthy countries have and take for granted - that they expect, and should be entitled to expect from a good government that has their backs. It is not much to ask in a country that is wealthier economically than it has ever been, and when we are debating, as we are today, the general allocation of resources in the broad sense. Our absolute focus in the future needs to be on investment in universal public services that work, and that are accountable, to give some hope of a better, fairer future for every citizen of this country.

I want to talk in the few minutes I have about some capital projects in Kerry, which badly need to be progressed. In a county like Kerry, with 13 blue flag beaches, mountains, lakes and coastline that are the envy of many, unfortunately we have a major structural deficit. In order for people to reside in their own home areas, we need a massive injection of funding to bring us up to a level that is taken for granted in some of those other counties. Yesterday, I was in Castlegregory, where I met Pat Barry and John Buckley to discuss the challenges for the development of that village. The sewerage system, if you could call it that, is no more than an open pit and an Imhoff tank, which was probably built 70 years ago. It is fewer than 25 m from the local secondary school and about 150 m to 200 m from one of the 13 blue flag beaches in the county. It is a village that has been repeatedly overlooked for investment. I am asking the Minister to inject more money into the programme for wastewater treatment plant systems in Kerry and to include Castlegregory in that. There are ecological and health imperatives to this. I received some emission limit values from tests that have been done. While I accept that Irish Water has carried out some works in the past few years with pipes, rebuilt manholes, etc., there is nowhere close to reasonable effluent quality. In fact, there is an argument that it is actually worse coming out of the pit that is near the centre of the village than anywhere else. I would love to be able to say that Castlegregory is alone in this but there are other villages in Kerry such as Ballyduff, Fenit - which has a similar Imhoff tank or pit near another blue flag beach - and Abbeydorney, to name but a few, where more funding is necessary for these purposes. I also want to raise the need for a public building on the Denny site in Tralee. We recently asked for a meeting with Kerry County Council. There is a building that is owned, I understand, by a Canadian pension fund. The education and training board, ETB, the Courts Service and the HSE are renting properties from it. An opportunity has arisen because the old town council was granted a site on the old Denny factory in the middle of the town. The ETB is paying about €300,000 per year, the Courts Service is paying over €100,000 and the HSE refused to say how much it is paying when I asked it in a parliamentary question but I will get to the bottom of that later. The Minister can be sure that there is over €500,000 in State funding being paid every year for rental on this property. I ask the Minister to encourage Kerry County Council and make funding available to it in order to construct a building that will save money and bring the 140 people who are currently working there into the centre of town where they will be spending money on the retail offering that is in the town centre. Last week I asked about the roof of the Bryan MacMahon hall at Scoil Réalta na Maidine, the boys' school in Listowel. It is 70 years old and was not constructed to modern building practices. I ask the Minister to make funding available for that. Last but not least, we have been waiting three years, since the Maskey report showed there were 46 children exposed to significant harm and 240 children at risk of harm in south Kerry, and still the north Kerry review has not been published. Over €2 million, I understand, has been spent on it. I was told in July that the north Kerry report would be made available as soon as possible. The file reviews were completed then-----

The Deputy should conclude.

-----but there is still no sign of it. Would the Minister ever get that published so that the people can have answers and be included in the scheme, and so that the children who are at risk of heavy weight gain and an awful lot of other difficulties are not further punished by having to pay for their own medical reports? If they are in the scheme, they do not have to pay for it. It is inexcusable that they have not been included in it to date.

Tír gan teanga, tír gan anam; tá sé sin fíor. It is equally true to say that a city without arts and culture spaces is a city without a soul. I join others in urging the Government to intervene in regard to The Complex arts centre. It is really important that we do not continue to have arts and artists being pushed out of Dublin city. We need more, not fewer, arts and community spaces and spaces for culture, and we need more creativity in the city to have a happy, thriving city. This Bill is a constitutional requirement that is necessary to keep our public services running and keep the show on the road. It presents a good opportunity to scrutinise Government spending and take stock of what we should be doing better. It is remarkable that this Government managed to put together a €9.4 billion budget that leaves the most vulnerable worse off. The Government is spending like there is no tomorrow, according to the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, but there are still well over 5,000 children who will spend Christmas in homeless emergency accommodation. That number has increased month after month since this Government took office. Disabled people have had their incomes cut by up to €1,400. Pensioners are afraid to turn on the heating. There are families struggling to afford the basics at the supermarket, so where exactly are these billions going? They are not being targeted at those who need it most. The budget should have been an opportunity to show foresight, discipline and responsibility. Instead, it has become a case study in how this Government ignores expert advice, dismisses the evidence and gambles recklessly with the future of our public finances. The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, the Nevin Economic Research Institute, the Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, the Commission on Taxation and Welfare and the Parliamentary Budget Office, PBO, have all, in different ways, issued stark warnings and those warnings were ignored. The fiscal council warned that this Government's budgetary policy was adding fuel to an economic fire. It highlighted that spending growth was rising far above sustainable levels and that repeated budget over-runs were baked into the system. Most damning of all, it showed that our surpluses exist only because of windfall corporation tax receipts from a handful of multinationals. Strip those out and Ireland is already running a deficit of €7.4 billion in 2025, rising to €13.6 billion in 2026. These windfalls should have been invested in infrastructure projects that will benefit our long-term economic security. Instead, in large part, they were used to cut taxes for developers and fast-food chains. The council's verdict was devastating. On this, it said: "The Government is budgeting like there is no tomorrow." The Nevin Economic Research Institute echoed these warnings. Before the budget, it said that fiscal policy was already running too hot. After the budget, its assessment was blunt. It said: "We are channelling the 2000s with boom-time budgeting for a boom-time economy." It condemned the complacency bred by headline surpluses, which exist only because of corporation tax windfalls. It warned that if those receipts vanish, Ireland will be left with a massive deficit. It singled out one measure as particularly reckless: the VAT cut for the hospitality sector. In its words, wasting €700 million annually on a low-pay, low-productivity industry was "a breathtakingly feckless waste of resources". It pointed out some of the ways we could have used €700 million. We could have hired 11,000 additional nurses, made public transport free or lifted 50,000 children out of poverty. Instead, it was handed to the loudest lobby group. The ESRI gave similar warnings. In September, it warned that fiscal policy was pro-cyclical, stimulating demand in an economy already at or above capacity. It urged targeted investment in infrastructure bottlenecks and preparation for predictable long-term pressures like climate change and ageing. After the budget its analysis was damning. It found that budget 2026 would actually reduce disposable incomes with average losses of 2%. Low-income households were hit hardest, losing 4.1% of disposable income. Low-income households already making choices between heating or eating cannot afford any more cuts to their income. They do not have a single cent to spare. This shows the priorities of this Government and how out of touch it is. Those who are struggling get thrown under the bus while there are tax cuts aplenty for those at the top. The Commission on Taxation and Welfare provided the long-term roadmap. Its report, Foundations for the Future, made one point above all others: Ireland must broaden its tax base. It recommended shifting the balance of taxation away from labour and towards capital and consumption. It urged reforms to PRSI, increases in wealth taxes and a gradual phasing out of reduced VAT rates. Budget 2026 did the opposite. Instead of broadening the tax base, it narrowed it. Reckless VAT cuts were introduced for developers and fast-food chains in direct contradiction of the commission's recommendations. These cuts erode revenues and leave Ireland even more dependent on volatile corporation tax receipts. The commission's message was clear that Ireland's overall level of tax base must grow to meet the challenges of ageing, climate change and debt. Budget 2026 moved in the opposite direction. Finally the PBO was scathing in its assessment of budget 2026. It condemned the reckless tax cuts for hospitality and property developers and warned that subsidies of €675 million for developers were introduced without any analysis of how they interact with the housing market, whether they are effective or whether they create intended consequences. It warned that giant tax cuts for the hospitality sector were not likely to result in lower prices for consumers but instead would be pocketed by the likes of McDonald's and Domino's. The PBO analysis made it abundantly clear that budget 2026 was built on a weak evidence base with tax expenditures rolled out to the loudest lobby groups rather than meeting the greatest needs in the country. Let us take stock. The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council told us we are budgeting like there is no tomorrow, the Nevin Economic Research Institute warned that we are channeling the mid-2000s with boom-time budgeting and the ESRI told us we risk overheating and leaving ourselves exposed. The Commission on Taxation and Welfare previously warned that we need to broaden the tax base and yet the Government narrowed it. The PBO told us the reckless tax cuts for hospitality and property developers are fiscally unsustainable, economically unjustified and socially wasteful. These are five different independent bodies with five sets of warnings, all of which were ignored. Budget 2026 shows that the Government was unwilling to listen, plan and prepare with the advice that was given. It shows the Government choosing short-term politics over long-term sustainability and leaves Ireland dangerously exposed to the volatility of corporation tax, the predictable costs of an ageing population, the demands of climate change and the risk of future downturns. If it continues down this path, tomorrow will come with deficits, cutbacks and the public finance system unprepared for these challenges. These decisions were reckless. Government spending this year will be remembered for what it was: a story of bad choices and missed opportunities. The Government could have backed families struggling with energy bills. It could have abolished the means test for carers. It could have introduced a cost-of-disability payment, which was promised in a report in 2021 that has not yet been acted on. It could have reduced childcare costs as promised during the election, but that has not happened. It could have lifted 40,000 children out of poverty, but it did not. Instead it chose developers, large landlords and fast-food giants and chose recklessly to narrow our tax base. Once again, it shows that the priorities of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are more concerned with those at the top rather than looking after our long-term economic security. No amount of spin can disguise that. It can be seen. Rinne an Rialtas na roghanna míchearta. Má chaitheann muid súil siar at the mistakes that were made in the past in the run-up to the collapse of the Celtic tiger, we can see those same mistakes being repeated again. Céard atá ar siúl?

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this Bill this evening. It is clear that it is an essential part of what we need to put in place for spending for the coming year and the function has to be put through here. We understand that. I take the opportunity to speak about some issues in in my constituency and in the north west in general, particularly capital projects. Capital projects are certainly something we need to see greater investment in because the parts of the country that have been left behind the longest and have the least development are the places that have the most potential. If we could get the investment, we could certainly turn this around. The Government seems to have been blind to the north west for decades. It seems to ignore the potential of Sligo, Leitrim and Donegal and focuses instead on other areas for investment. We want to see projects that are not just spoken about but are actually invested in so that the money is put up-front and driven home. These projects include the N4 bypass in Carrick-on-Shannon in my own area, which is absolutely essential and needs to be done with haste. Anyone who travels from Sligo to Dublin most weekday evenings but certainly on a Friday evening knows that there could be a queue back almost as far as the Minister of State, Deputy Feighan's home town of Boyle. People are sometimes waiting for hours. This infrastructure badly needs to be put in place. The upgrade of the N17 is something we need to see delivered with haste as more and more people continue to lose their lives and the tragic accidents on that road continue to mount up every year. As we come to the end of another year, we all recognise the huge tragedy on our roads. Many of these road tragedies are a consequence of what were often called accident black spots but in actual fact are infrastructure deficits. These very dangerous multi-collision points on our roads need to be dealt with hastily. We need to see an upgrade of the Sligo-Dublin rail line. If I want to leave Dublin to go home on the train this evening, the last train leaves at 7.30 p.m. The last train to any region from the capital city should not be leaving at 7.30 in the evening. It should be leaving an awful lot later. We need better infrastructure and more frequency of services. We also need to see the introduction of a rail line in the western region. I welcome Irish Rail's recent decision that it is not interested in seeing a greenway being developed on the stretch of rail line that goes from Sligo to Galway, but wants to see a railway put on it. That is the western rail corridor, which has probably been talked about for generations at this stage. We need to see that put in place with haste and invested in because it can benefit the north west with significant advantages for people travelling through that region. There are many other infrastructural deficits that we see, with housing being the major one that captures everyone in every part of the country because it is the father and mother of many of our problems, for example in the health service and the education system. People cannot get housing. They cannot get places to live in. The reason developments cannot take place in many of the regions, including the north west, is that we do not have the water or wastewater infrastructure in place. In Carrick-on-Shannon, the development of water infrastructure is really serious and needs to be dealt with critically because it is at 110% capacity at the moment. That water treatment plant serves the whole of south Leitrim. If somebody comes in with planning permission in Mohill or Drumshanbo, they cannot get a letter from Uisce Éireann saying they will get a water connection because the water is not being delivered. All of these issues are having an impact. We also see the situation with the electricity grid being upgraded and the recent announcement about that. All of these things are welcome but we keep hearing more and more announcements, and those of us who live in the north west - certainly, in counties Leitrim or Sligo - see very little delivery. That is what needs to change. While we will support what is coming before us this evening in the context of this Bill, we need to see the investment on the ground. We need to see people out doing the work and we need to see delivery, and that needs to happen with haste.

A substantial amount of people's money is being spent on a yearly basis, and most of this spending is very welcome. However, significant moneys have been wasted in cases like the Leinster House bicycle shed and the delays in the construction of the national children's hospital. The delays to metro north could cost tens of millions of euro. This long-delayed and vital infrastructure is costing billions more than when it was first proposed. This brings me to another project that has been proposed for many years in my constituency and neighbouring constituencies. I refer to the metro west project, which was cancelled during the recession by Leo Varadkar and pushed back until 2035. For those unfamiliar with it, it is a metro link from Tallaght through Clondalkin, Lucan and Liffey Valley shopping centre into Dublin 15 and around to Blanchardstown shopping centre, the National Aquatic Centre and the Dublin economic zone, where it is proposed to have up to 50,000 workers; and from Meakstown to the airport. The proposed metro line has been protected by various councils through county development plans and is mostly a greenfield site. Last week, it was announced that the M50 motorway in Dublin is officially at capacity and maxxed out with record traffic levels exceeding Celtic tiger numbers leading to severe congestion. It is now carrying 160,000 vehicles every day on average. The peak is closer to 190,000, making it Ireland's busiest road. Transport Infrastructure Ireland has acknowledged that the motorway is at its limit with little more physical capacity to add forcing a reliance on other solutions. This has led to extremely long commute times of sometimes more than three hours, gridlock for minor incidents and a negative impact on the economy, people and surrounding communities because it does not just affect the M50. It affects our community as well when the traffic is backed up all through the N3, through Blanchardstown and Dublin 15 and up to Tyrrelstown. Experts and officials point to a significant investment in public transport such as DART and Luas, better cycling infrastructure and policy changes to shift commuters away from cars as the only real fix. Transport Infrastructure Ireland has stated that it has done all it can physically do and that solutions require significant policy changes, increased public transport and investment in alternatives. Metro west would provide links to the new DART+ rail line, which will go from Maynooth to the city centre. It is designed to link at St. Mochtas Football Club in Clonsilla with DART+, providing a direct link to the city centre. It would also link with the huge developments now being built at Kellystown, Clonsilla and Castleknock, and provide transport links to the Blanchardstown Centre, the National Aquatic Centre, the sports campus at Abbotstown, the Dublin economic zone and on to the airport. Given our road network system is now pretty much at capacity in the city, is it not time we have a real look at metro west? Is it now time to look at funding for the future? We know if we delay, then it will cost billions and billions more. This has been in the planning for 20 plus years. It was delayed because of the recession. At the time, maybe you could understand that but now there is no excuse. There is no excuse whatsoever, given the total gridlock on the M50 and surrounding areas, not to proceed with metro west. I urge the Minister, when he talks to his colleagues around the Cabinet table, to bring this forward. We have been talking about this for seven or eight years now. Let us bring it forward and get it delivered for people right the way from Tallaght all the way to the airport.

Deputy Richard O'Donoghue is sharing time with Deputy Michael Collins.

Every time I come in here, I look across the benches and see where we cannot get delivery. I then look at communities where any time something is wanted or somebody is in trouble, people ask what they can do to help, even if they have not got it themselves. Yesterday, I was in Limerick. It is a tradition in Limerick that Fossett's Circus comes there. Fossett's Circus does a charity night, every time it comes to Limerick, for people just to go to see a circus. It offers a full night. It offered me tickets to give to agencies that want to go to see a circus. I go to different communities that offer the same but when it comes to governance, the same thing is not awarded. A crèche in Banogue is waiting for a letter from Uisce Éireann. The funding is there to build it to support the local school and local families who are working in the area. A letter from Uisce Éireann to say it will now upgrade the system is all that is wanted for the local authority to give the go-ahead. It has been going around in circles for three months now. People want to start it for the betterment of the community. We talk about where our tax is going and the minimum wage. I have no problem with a wage increase but if it does not make a difference in the pockets of the people getting it, I do have a problem with it. We see today that the minimum wage of €13.50 will be increased to €14.15, which will give a person an increase of €26. It is not an increase of €26, however, because of the tax bands. When the USC charge was lowered, the Government never moved the tax bands, so that person will pay more tax on it. When you break it down, take off the 1.5% auto-enrolment, which is also starting in January, and keep breaking it down, the person who will get the minimum wage increase is not getting an increase. What it does is drive inflation because people on the other side have to put up their costs. People asked me why the hospitality sector got a reduction in VAT. The hospitality sector is one of the cases where the minimum wage will come in. It will have four wage increases coming next January, in the short term. If you add that to the knock-on process of all the different wage increases across the sector, the 4% decrease it got will not add a cent to inflation. At the Committee on Budgetary Oversight that I chair, I asked people from the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, IFAC, whether it would create an inflation cost; it would not. What it does is absorb the costs the sector has got in the past three years, and stops it increasing the price of food, beverages and everything within that sector. It was the right thing to do. I thank the Government for eventually doing it because, otherwise, it will be a circular economy. It will come back around to the same people who have got the wage increase paying more for the same product. We then look at every person who is paying PRSI and PAYE, who is also paying into the National Training Fund, but it does not actually go to funding national training. It goes around; it was voted on recently that it be used to buy up properties. It is taking from a fund for training people. That money has been sitting in accounts and building up for years. It could never be touched but now the Government wants it to go into something that is not based on training. We have a lot of very good projects that could be built. We talked about UHL today. I thank the Minister for saying that she is looking at options A and B, and all the sectors of it, but it is about the delivery of this. We are talking about 36 beds being delivered next year and it is hoped to increase that to 178 beds before 2030. The commercial sensitivity of getting extra lands is being talked about. We have also talked about developers saying they will build it on the same basis as a mortgage system, where they will build it, give it back, and it will cost a euro. If they do not have the funding to deliver it now, they will deliver the project within two years to help people save lives. How many more people's lives will it take before the Government listens to businesspeople and lets them deliver the infrastructure and buildings for it? It can then invest in the healthcare that needs to go into these buildings. How many more people will die before we do that? We are at Christmastime. I was at a funeral during the week. One person turned around to me after she buried her mother and said, "Please, please, please Richard, if you do anything, will you please sort out UHL?". A new CEO is coming in place. I hope and pray they have the capability to bring people with them to get the adequate staff that hospital needs. There is one accident and emergency department for 45,000 people. Hospitals were downgraded without thinking of the impact of an increasing population. That is recklessness. People are dying needlessly, while they are waiting for care. On the other side of that, people do not want to be employed by the hospital because of the stigma that was attached to it. Something radical needs to change. The management in place at the moment are trying to change it. They have been in contact with us in trying to change this but unless they get the proper staffing and proper people employed there, they cannot do that. It goes back to the question of how many more people have to die before the Government listens to people who can deliver infrastructure for it. I have been talking here about this, and I know the Minister has looked at certain parts of it. I will give him praise for what he does. He has listened to us talking about delivery of public versus private, and looking at budgets for delivery of public buildings that are privately built and then taken over by the public. We are looking at delivery of infrastructure that will then be given over to the likes of Uisce Éireann, where it will be built on time and on budget, making money travel further. We will get delivery faster. That is what it is about. Young people trying to get on the property ladder have moved in with their parents. Under the laws that are there, even if they have a modular unit out the back at the moment, they are being penalised by the local authority because the Bill, for people trying to move home to try to save to get on the housing ladder, has not gone through the House yet. We are going to introduce modular units at the back of houses, which will hopefully come about early next year, but the Government has only allowed an extra 5 sq. m to the planning guidelines when a two-bed apartment is 63 sq. m. We have asked the Government to bring it up to 63 sq. m to allow for liveable accommodation. If elderly people said they would move into the modular unit to let the family move into their house, it would not be big enough to accommodate them either because the Government does not have the foresight to allow for a two-bedroom unit to be built on-site, which would be 63 sq. m. We are now looking at 45 sq. m. Will it not look at this again? What happens if a person living in the modular unit gets sick and somebody has to move in to take care of them? What happens if a carer is coming in to take care of an elderly parent? It is simple legislation. Listen to the people who know about it. Our budgets have to be costed from now on by people who deliver on time, pay taxes and make profits. The Minister and Minister of State have to cost their Department's delivery of infrastructure, whether it is housing or any development. Costings have to be evenly based across the board to make sure their Department is accountable. That means they could deliver more for less.

I will start with some criticism I heard about the Government's introduction of a lower rate for the hospitality sector. I welcome that from the bottom of my heart because I know what it means. It tells you how out of touch with reality the Social Democrats, the Labour Party and People Before Profit are that they do not understand the benefit of the VAT rate going down from 13% to 9%. It is an astonishing attack on ordinary small businesses throughout the country that they come in here time and again condemning the Government for lowering that VAT rate when we know, as do the people on the ground, that it will mean the very survival of a lot of cafes throughout the country. I welcome that, as I always have. I pushed for it also. I will not stand up here and be critical about it. It is scandalous to think that these parties are so out of touch. I know businesses the length and breadth of west Cork and Ireland, because I have met a lot of them, are furious with the Social Democrats, the Labour Party and People Before Profit who are attacking them continuously for getting that chance of survival. Even though I wish it was done straight away, it happened during the year. They needed that and the Government has given them that chance and that is something we all have to welcome and not attack. They keep throwing that decrease in with the McDonald's carry on. It is an outrageous attack on small businesses to peg them to that sector and it is not fair. I have raised disability here. Those with disabilities lost €1,400 in the last budget. That is an astonishing attack on a lot of elderly people and people who have severe disabilities who cannot fight back. They have seen energy costs increase and the blister pack cost coming on board. It is another hit. These people are suffering. They are mainly elderly people who need a little respect and do not need to be picked on but that is what the Government has done. The blister pack thing is outrageous and we will debate it later on. Energy credits were given last year, prior to the budget and the general election. They gave people hope that the Government was giving them serious consideration and was sympathetic towards their needs but by God it sure showed this time that it did not care now that the election was over. There are 300,000 people in serious debt and they desperately need the Government to intervene. They do not know whether or not they will have a light on for Christmas. That is a serious blow to anybody, regardless of what they think people have. I would appreciate it if the Government looked at that again. There is no point saying there are lots of pluses in the budget if the Government turns around and hits the most vulnerable in society like those with disabilities and those who cannot pay bills. I looked at a lot of expenditure and announcements in the budget. I do not see any announcement for roads like the N71 in west Cork, the R585 or the R586, the Innishannon bypass, the northern or southern Bandon relief road, the Bantry bypass or the Clonakilty bypass. There is nothing - zero. The AIRO report a number of years ago was drawn up by an independent body for Cork County Council and made it clear that Cork County Council was getting the lowest amount of money for roads and for so many other budgets. Nothing has changed. On roads all the way from Innishannon to Skibbereen you cannot pass a car. I hear the Minister goes to Kinsale on and off for meetings and things like that. You cannot pass a car. There are no passing bays. People are pulling the hair out their heads. This leads to accidents, unfortunately. It is time to spend money on roads. We do not have rail. That should surely mean extra would be put into roads in those areas if they do not have rail. We do not even have a sign for 150 km of roadway to rail in west Cork. Then there is this thing called Connecting Ireland, which is a farce. If you cannot deliver rail, you cannot connect and you cannot deliver proper road structure. There is something wrong somewhere and someone is not talking. Our politicians in west Cork, who are in government, whether from Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil, are not delivering for the people of west Cork. That is the bottom line. Year in, year out, and I am here since 2016, I have asked for passing bays. I have not asked for flyovers or anything dramatic. I am asking for common sense passing bays and they are refused continuously. God almighty, if they would step aside for six-months, we would have it done. We would need no help. We would put in a machine and get the goddamn roads widened and let people get on with their business. We would let the tractor and the lorry driver drive on the N71 and spend an hour or hour and a half getting from A to B while not holding up the motorist who is trying to get on with their business. There needs to be a real awakening as to what is going on in the real world. I will move on to wastewater. We need more housing in west Cork and the wastewater is in an absolutely scandalous condition. We have Shannonvale, which was brought up by Councillor Daniel Sexton last week. There is black water for people to drink in Shannonvale and Clonakilty. Uisce Éireann is not accountable. It does not have to answer questions. It is the same in Rosscarbery, Dunmanway, Ballydehob and Goleen. I could go on. Tomorrow morning, we will read an EPA report saying what the farmers are doing wrong but it will not point the finger at the reality of the crisis. The reality of the crisis is that wastewater treatment tanks are bursting raw sewage into our beautiful waters. Those are the facts, and I am raw from saying it. I spent the past number of months looking to have a meeting about Adrigole. We are supposed to have a meeting but I do not see any date. People have had 14 disruptions in their water the past number of months. It is unfair for any community to have to put up with that. No one should expect that in a modern society. We cannot find out when the council will come in and dig up the pipe, give them the funding and deliver a proper water structure for the people of Adrigole. There are suggestions and solutions from the community and we are begging. That is not being delivered. We look then at where money is being spent and wasted. Millions of euro are being wasted by TII on greenways without any consultation but only dictation to landowners. I have seen it in west Cork. There is no such thing as sitting down to talk with a landowner. It will take a 20 m tar roadway through their farm whether they like it or not. Jesus, you would not expect that in a dictator's world but we are accepting it in this country. The Minister is the man with his fingers on the purse and he has to ask whether this money is being spent properly. Are these landowners being dictated to? In the Cooley Peninsula, 1,000 people attended a meeting two weeks ago in a fury about their land being taken from them. God almighty, the Minister would not expect his land to be taken from him and neither would I. We expect that there is a right for these genuine, hardworking farming people to have their land swiped from under them, whether they like it or not that. That is where the wastage of money is coming into play. The people of Kilcrohane, the Sheep's Head Peninsula, the Sheep's Head way and the Beara Way were never dictated to. There was never a CPO put on lands, only a lovely walkway made with consultation. TII can now dictate by wagging a CPO in front of somebody. We have to cop on. This is Ireland in 2025 and we have to respect the people who live in it and pay their taxes in it. We have a lot of discussions regarding childcare and many families are in dire straits. What frustrates me is what people are genuinely saying when I meet them. They say they have two great incomes coming into their house but they cannot survive. There is something wrong when you hear that and when people honestly admit they have two good incomes coming into the home but they still cannot survive. There is something seriously wrong. Childcare costs are astronomical and are out of control. We have sat by idly in here and allowed that to happen. There is talk about a rainy day fund. I sincerely hope the Government has €110 million because that is what is costing fisheries because of that stinking, rotten deal done in Europe last Friday. Fishermen are going to be €112 million out of pocket. I plead with the Minister to find that €112 million because it looks like the national Exchequer is going to have to pay that money. Is the Minister going to throw crumbs to the Irish fishermen and expect they are going to take it? It is a wipe-out. I have met people with trawlers that have spent €6 million, €8 million, €10 million and €12 million to put a good trawler out to sea to bring Irish fish back into our own country. Now, we have Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and other countries robbing our Irish fish and we have allowed them. We have patted them on the back, we have praised them and we have given them a great honour to do that. It is time to stand up and prove a budget is for the people. It has not been for the people for the past number of years, and certainly the last budget was one of the most scandalous budgets ever in the State.

Obviously, this is a technical Bill. We have it every year and it is an absolute requirement. We will be supporting it on that basis but it gives us an opportunity to speak on capital projects. To follow on from the previous Deputy, it is fair to say there is a considerable amount of anger in the Cooley Peninsula. I was at the meeting in Cooley Hall. The fact is there is absolute fear that people's homes or farms could be CPOd and there is an element of Louth County Council and TII having lost the dressing room too early. There is a need for a greater level of engagement but I know Anton Waters and many other elected representatives have looked for almost a postponement of the review process that is ongoing on the delivery of CPOs. I call on the Minister and Government to do what they can on this because we have all seen greenways delivered, and very delivered well. We need to see proper engagement with people and it cannot be under the fear of CPO. I do not think there is anyone who believes that is, in any way, justified, particularly when we are talking about such a project. Like many others, I am absolutely aghast at what I heard yesterday on rail prioritisation and the fact it looks like it will not be prioritised where I am from. I am speaking specifically about the idea of the new line from Clongriffin to Drogheda. This was to allow for further express services to Dundalk, Drogheda, Newry and Belfast. We know the vital importance of this to that part of the world I am talking about, not just for population but for cross-Border reasons and everything else. I ask for a review in relation to this particular issue. We could look at there being some element of sense and sensibility here. Like many others, we could go on about Uisce Éireann. In my part of the world, we are forced into the scenario of the delivery of interim wastewater schemes as new housing schemes are built. This will obviously lead to added cost. I know the Minister has dealt with some of these issues previously, or is at least aware of them. This just tells you where wastewater capacity is in Louth. In certain parts of Dundalk, it leads to real fear of flooding, even in the part of the world I live in. I mention Dundalk south, anywhere from Cluan Enda right through to Bay Estate and beyond. These are very particular issues that need to be looked at. I brought up the issue of CFRAM earlier with the Taoiseach and Minister of State, Deputy Moran. We have several projects throughout Louth but let us talk about the Dundalk-Blackrock south project. We are looking at quarter 4 of 2027 for submission of planning permission. That is a long way from what we need to protect the homes CFRAM was designed for. In fairness, the Minister has agreed to look at Blackrock and the likes from the point of view of whether there could be flood mitigations introduced before the proper flood mitigations but none of this is good enough. I have brought up the issue of schools, including Ardee Educate Together National School. We have to improve the planning process and the Ceann Comhairle will have heard me speaking about this before. We have a new school build of €7.6 million and this has been an ongoing project since 2012. We are looking at 34 staff and at best, there will be 21 parking spaces, of which three will be disabled parking bays. You are also looking at a place that has minibuses delivering to five ASD classes, for which there are only two parking bays. These are issues that need to be delivered on. I spoke to Louth County Council which is one of the facilitators in relation to this. I spoke to the planning department which said we could look at anything in relation to retention and whatever-----

Thank you, Deputy.

-----but there needs to be movement from Government and the Department. The problem is there are too many people responsible for this, so no one is responsible. We need to see delivery on this. It is not good enough.

I thank all the Members for their very helpful and informative ideas and contributions. We will certainly take many of them on board. The Appropriation Bill 2025 sets an amount that we appropriate for supply of services of €91.5 billion. This reflects the Estimates voted by the Dáil over the course of this year, including Revised, Further Revised and Supplementary Estimates. In gross terms and taking into account expenditure on the Social Insurance Fund and the National Training Fund, the total gross voted expenditure made available this year is €109.9 billion. As Deputy Ó Murchú said, the Appropriation Bill is a technical piece of legislation that authorises in law all the expenditure that has been agreed by way of Estimates during the year. The House will be aware the passage of the Bill is required to ensure it is possible to make payments in 2026 in respect of services that were funded from voted expenditure this year, including jobseeker's allowance, disability allowance, non-contributory State pension, nurses pay, Garda pay, teachers pay and all those who pay on pensions funded from voted money, payment of suppliers for goods and services, including SMEs. Of fundamental importance to those who depend on our essential public services is the passage of the Appropriation Bill which will allow for the payments required to deliver these public services to continue in 2026. Government continued investment in our ongoing critical public services during 2025, with a significant proportion of gross voted current expenditure allocated in the areas of health, housing, social protection, education and justice, all of which provide essential front-line public services. The funding provided this year will support a sustainable delivery of public services and infrastructure, providing a clear vision for the continuous improvement of public services, living standards and the infrastructure. This expenditure will ensure investment in better public services, anticipating and meeting the needs of our growing and changing population, and investment in digitalisation and climate initiatives. To address our infrastructure needs, Government has made clear capital investment is a priority for the years ahead. As part of this prioritisation, Government has completed a review of the national development plan which was published in July of this year. The NDP review is the most ambitious investment plan launched in the history of the State. The review provides us with the potential to transform our built environment, through permanent and sustainable interventions focused on the medium- and long-term health of our economy and country. Taking into account the total gross voted capital expenditure for 2026, set out in the budget and the addition of capital carryover in the Appropriation Bill, over €19.3 billion will be available for capital spending next year. The increased investment plays an important role in delivering much-needed public infrastructure across Ireland and the sectors such as social housing, education and higher education, primary healthcare, public transport, water infrastructure, climate change adaption and mitigation. In 2024, due to an unexpected shortfall in appropriation-in-aid not matched by consummate savings and expenditure subheads, an excess Vote of €9,680 was recorded for the 2024 Appropriation Account for Vote 14 - State Laboratory. This led to a net deficit in the Vote, which the Comptroller and Auditor General referred to at the public accounts committee. At a committee meeting on 9 October 2025 the Comptroller and Auditor General referred the excess expenditure recorded for Vote 14 to the committee. The committee noted the Accounting Officer had stated that the State Laboratory has implemented appropriate procedures to prevent a similar situation arising in the future. In light of the assurances from the Accounting Officer, the committee saw no objection to this sum being provided by Excess Vote. The committee agreed an interim report at its meeting of 9 October 2025 in respect of excess expenditure incurred by the State Laboratory, indicating that the committee saw no objection to the sum provided by excess Vote. Our social protection system seeks to provide an effective social safety net for the more vulnerable members of society and when expenditure on the Social Insurance Fund is included, the 2025 gross expenditure allocation for social protection is €27.5 billion. This allows delivery of an adequate and sustainable social protection and pension support system and better outcomes in tackling poverty through providing a wide range of income support schemes. It helps to support the standard of living of the most vulnerable in our society. In particular, funding provided in 2025 enabled improvements in the social welfare system for people on a range of income supports, as well as providing additional support for families and people on illness programmes, disability programmes and carers' programmes. For example, 2035 funding enabled a €12 increase in core weekly social welfare rates, an increase in the weekly rates of child support payments by €4 for under 12s and €8 for over 12s. There was a €60 increase in the working family payment income thresholds and an extension of fuel allowance to those in receipt of carer's allowance. There was also the introduction of a €280 newborn grant for each child born in the State to help parents with the initial costs of parenting. On housing, to the end of quarter 3 2025 there were 24,297 home completions, an increase of 12% over the same period in 2024. In 2024, 10,581 new social homes were delivered, including 7,857 new-build homes, 1,501 acquisitions and 1,223 homes delivered through the leasing programmes. In the first six months of 2025, 3,918 affordable housing options were delivered, which represents 61% of 2025's delivery target. This is a 44% increase in delivery compared to the same period in 2024. The biggest drivers of affordable delivery were first home schemes with 1,558; vacant property refurbishment grants, 1,334; AHB cost-rental, 497; and local authority affordable purchase, 359. Education funding in 2025 provided an appropriate school place to over 975,000 students in primary, post-primary and special schools around the country. To support the education of these students a record number of teachers totalling approximately 78,000 are employed by the Department of Education and Youth. In addition, over 700 new teachers were employed in September 2035 for the commencement of the 2025-26 school year. To support the education of students with special educational needs over 400 new special classes were sanctioned for the 2025-26 school year. This brings the total number of special classes to over 3,700. Five new special schools were confirmed for the 2025-26 school year, bringing the total to 129 special schools, catering for approximately 9,000 children and young people with complex special educational year. Alongside this increase in special classes and special schools is an increase of the number of SNAs. There was an increase of a further 1,600 special needs assistants in September 2025, bringing the total number of SNAs working in schools to over 20,000. Capital funding in 2025 will amount to €1.6 billion to support a continued progression of the circa 300 building projects in the school building programme that are currently at construction stage. In 2025, funding for the Department of Transport has enabled delivery on a number of key projects. There was a continuation of the fare initiatives, the 20% adult fare discount, the 50% discount and a 90-minute fare which reduce the cost of public transport and encourage modal shifts. Progress was made on the construction of the first 12 BusConnects phase 4 bus corridors, with a second due to begin in early 2026. A number of key public transport projects have been progressed through 2025, with railway orders for Dart+West, Dart+South West and Dart+ Coastal North, and procurement under way. Construction on key projects also included the M28, Cork to Ringaskiddy, Adare bypass and the N5, Ballaghadereen to Scramogue. There has also been a lot of very good announcements on the N4, Longford to Mullingar and the N17. I thank all the contributors for today's debate and thank them for their help and information.