I know that I am completely out of order in doing so, but may I say very briefly that I agree with what Deputy Barrett has said. The people of the Ballybrack area need more than the Minister's sympathy in relation to that matter.
Dublin Ring Road Tolling.
They are getting active assistance and action.
They need to see it.
Acting Chairman
Deputy Gilmore, should proceed with his statement.
I thank the Ceann Comhairle for allowing me to raise the issue of the tolling of the Dublin Ring Road. I ask the Minister for the Environment to come clean with the people of County Dublin: will he or will he not place a toll on the Dublin Ring Road, which has now been constructed? All of the indications are that we will place a toll on that road.
In early 1989 the Minister for the Environment advertised for tenders for the tolling of the Dublin Ring Road and, subsequently, awarded a contract to an American company. The issue of the tolling of the Dublin Ring Road came to a head last summer when, under the Minister's instructions, toll booths were erected on the road, which was then under construction. When Dublin County Council found out about that they took a decision ordering the removal of the toll booths at a cost that the Minister admitted to be £50,000 and for which he told the House he took responsibility.
Two weeks ago in the House I asked the Minister how much money had been paid in connection with the tolling of the Dublin Ring Road. I was astonished when the Minister told me that £2.3 million of taxpayers money had already been paid out in that regard. I then asked another question, which was answered last week, about what that money had been spent on. The Minister informed me that it related to the lengthening of the ramps at the Naas interchange with the Dublin Ring Road to provide for toll booth areas together with the necessary queueing areas while still maintaining the acceleration link from toll booth to entry to the motorway necessary for safe merging of sliproad and motorway traffic and the provision of concrete aprons with service connections and toll booth bases in the immediate toll plaza areas.
Under existing law Dublin County Council are the only body who can decide to place a toll on the Western Ring Road, and I ask why almost £2.5 million of taxpayers' money was paid to do something that the competent authority, Dublin County Council, had decided should not be done. On whose authority did the Minister spend that enormous amount of taxpayers' money? The roads of this country are full of potholes and many of the roads are in great need of repair, yet the Minister is prepared to spend almost £2.5 million of taxpayers' money for which he did not have authority from the county council. The managing director of a private company would be fired if he did something of that nature without the authority of his board of directors or some other authority. I should like to hear the Minister's explanation for spending that amount of money.
The second question to which I should like a clear answer from the Minister concerns his intentions in relation to tolling. It is known that the only body who stand between the people of Dublin and tolls on the Western Ring Road are Dublin County Council, the competent authority at the moment. However, it is also known that under the roads Bill introduced by the Minister he intends to take that authority from the county and give it to the National Roads Authority. I should like to know before the local elections, whether the Minister intends to have tolls in addition to the toll already there. Does he intend to toll the remainder of the Western Ring Road? This evening I should like to hear a clear, unequivocal answer to that question.
Before I deal specifically with the points raised by the Deputy I want to put the issue in its proper context. A brief review of the background is essential to a proper understanding of this topic.
It has been the policy of successive Governments, and successive Governments representative of the main parties in the House, to encourage toll based private investment in roads to accelerate the development of the road network. That position was outlined initially in the road development plan for the eighties which was published in 1979, and has been repeated several times since, particularly in roads plans published in 1985 and 1989 and in the recent operational programme on peripherality. In the light of that longstanding policy, my Department engaged consultants in June 1988 to report on the possibility of further tolling of the Dublin Ring Road.
A toll agreement had already been signed on the west link. The consultants concluded further tolling could be expected to generate substantial private investment. Based on the experience gained in the negotiations on the east link and the west link toll franchise agreements, it was decided that the most expeditious and effective way to make progress was for the Department of the Environment to take a lead role in the invitation of proposals and for a steering committee representative of the Departments of Finance and the Environment and Dublin County Council to assess proposals and conduct the subsequent negotiations.
In March 1989 private investors were invited by public advertisement to submit proposals for a toll franchise for the Dublin Ring Road. I must stress that the advertisement and detailed brief to interested parties were provided to Dublin County Council in advance and the advertisement, and the accompanying press statement, made it clear that the invitation was being issued without prejudice to the relevant statutory procedures.
On foot of a recommendation from the Steering Committee, the Government decided that, subject to the statutory procedures, negotiations in relation to the toll franchise should be undertaken on an exclusive basis with one of the proposers — a consortium led by Manufactures Hanover Ltd. a US bank and including Cofiroute, a French private toll road operator. This decision was formally notified to the county council in September 1989 by my Department. The Department's letter was considered and noted by the three committees of the council in October-November 1989 and there was no indication to my Department that there was any objection to the course being pursued.
That is not so. There were several communications.
During the negotiations with the chosen consortium certain adjustments were identified as necessary to the ramps being constructed on the Western Parkway so as to permit tolling. The road works in question — the lengthening of ramps and the provision of concrete aprons and bases for toll booths — were designed to provide an adequate area for toll facilities while maintaining sufficient acceleration length for entry to the motorway.
The works did not involve the provision of toll booths or toll equipment. The works were undertaken as part of the construction contract for the Western Parkway as this was clearly the most cost-effective approach. If they had been undertaken at some stage after the road was open to traffic it would have cost substantially more and would have involved road closures and traffic disruption. No doubt I would have been criticised at that time for not having had the foresight to carry out these works when the road was being built.
Turning to the specific point raised by the Deputy, I want to strongly refute the suggestion that there was no authority for the expenditure of the £2.3 million on the roadworks to facilitate tolling. Dublin County Council, as a road authority, have ample statutory authority to undertake roadworks, which these were and I as Minister am empowered to pay grants in respect of such works. The decision to proceed with the works was in keeping with the principle of reasonable advance provision common to major infrastructure projects.
You were pre-empting the decision.
Dublin County Council who were regularly informed of progress and represented at official level on the steering committee raised no objections to tolling the Western Parkway up to the time the works were authorised and undertaken. It was only some months later — in October 1990 — that the council passed a resolution objecting to tolls on the Western Parkway.
We sought a meeting with the Department in February 1990 and could not get it.