Vol. 411 No. 5
38 Mr. Stagg asked the Minister for the Environment if his attention has been drawn to (a) the substantial damage to the road network in County Meath which resulted from the winter's severe weather (b) the fact that an extra £4 million is required to repair the damage and (c) the acute cash shortage facing Meath County Council; the steps he is prepared to take to assist Meath County Council; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
In January 1991 I asked county councils to submit reports on the damage caused, and the estimated cost of remedial works, to public roads and bridges as a result of the severe weather conditions in the early part of the month. Following technical examination of the reports received, I allocated grants totalling £2.48 million to 18 county councils for the areas most affected. The estimate of the damage in respect of Meath County Council was £92,270, an amount which could not be considered abnormal in the context of weather conditions during Irish winters, and consequently, no allocation was made to the council. An estimate of the cost of repairing damage to roads caused by snowfalls was not received from the council until 14 March 1991, by which time the funds available to me for road grants has been fully allocated.
Meath County Council have been treated fairly in the overall allocation of road grants in 1991. The discretionary road grant allocations which I notified to the council amounts to £2.375 million, compared with grant payments of £2.363 million in 1990 and £1.44 million in 1989. The 1991 grants include a supplementary grant of £300,000 in recognition of the special needs of the county in relation to regional and county roads. The 1991 national road grant allocations for the county amount to £7.450 million, the fifth highest allocation to any county council in the country.
