Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 10 May 2005

Vol. 602 No. 1

Leaders’ Questions (Resumed).

Mr. Rabbitte

The Taoiseach was asked what is the position on the terminal at Dublin Airport. Having listened to him I have no idea what is the answer. He seems to suggest that the present terminal has a capacity of 20 million passengers and since only 17 million passengers use it, there is plenty of space. If that is what he is saying, it is easily known that neither he nor the Tánaiste need to go through the airport. What is the answer to the question? Does the Taoiseach support the Ryanair wing of the Government or will the terminal be built with State funds? If the latter is the case, will the Government do a better job on it than on the many projects listed in last night's "Prime Time" programme, which showed that the waste and incompetence of the Government is like nothing ever seen in the western world. It compared the projects concerned with the experience elsewhere in OECD countries.

It was not possible to find a Minister, not even the Minister of State at the Department of Finance, Deputy Parlon, or the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy McDowell, who is never shy of going before a camera. Where were they last night? At least in the days when the Minister for Defence, Deputy O'Dea, was available he would have gone out. However, since he became the Rommel of Southill he does not have the time for that kind of thing.

What is the position on the terminal? Is the Taoiseach seriously telling the House that where the first terminal manifestly does not work and the second terminal cannot be agreed, the Government is to build a third terminal? The Government will end up building a terminal for every Progressive Democrats Deputy. What is the position? Has the Government decided who will operate the terminal, who will build it and who will own it? Is it true that a third terminal is in prospect? When will a decision be made? Does Michael O'Leary not at least have a fair point in saying that the Government has now been dithering for three years? While the issue has gone on for approximately six years, for three years the Government has been incapable of making a decision. The Taoiseach has now told the House that the airport has capacity for 20 million and as we have only reached 17 million, there is plenty of space for everyone who can queue into the night. The Taoiseach and the Tánaiste are happy that people should need to queue interminably to egress from the country.

The Taoiseach

Today I looked at the figures for the queues over the past week. For non-peak times it took 15 minutes to get through and for the peak times over the weekend it took 25 minutes. There are security issues. There will be 120 additional staff——

Ms O. Mitchell

Does the Taoiseach really believe there is no problem at Dublin Airport?

An Ceann Comhairle

Allow the Taoiseach to speak without interruption.

The Taoiseach

By mid-summer there will be 120 additional staff on the existing booths and five additional booths to deal with the throughput. We need pier D by 2007 and a second terminal by 2009. That is the position as stated by the Dublin Airport Authority and everybody else out there. When the Government has finalised the best and most efficient mechanism for doing this, we will announce all the details and will do so shortly. We are committed to doing that.

Deputy Rabbitte asked about a third terminal. As the Deputy knows all the people at Dublin Airport say that if the growth continues at the current rate, we will ultimately need and should think about possibly extending to cater for up to 60 million passengers in the longer term. That is not what we are thinking about for——

Mr. McCormack

Will we have the second terminal before the third one?

The Taoiseach

We will have the second one in plenty of time.

Mr. Allen

There will be plenty of time for both.

The Taoiseach

Deputy Rabbitte also mentioned roads and the overspend. The report of the Committee of Public Accounts, which the Deputy normally quotes, identified the increased costs when reviewing all the projects last year and not just 30 projects that were cherry picked for the "Prime Time" programme. It stated that 40% was due to inflation, 16% due to failure to cost certain elements at the planning stage, 20% due to changes in scope for projects and 24% due to project-specific increases such as the Dublin Port Tunnel, the south-eastern motorway and the N11 through the Glen of the Downs.

On Deputy Rabbitte's last question, unfortunately the Minister for Defence, Deputy O'Dea does not have the ability of bi-location. He was in another studio in RTE last night appearing on the "Questions and Answers" programme and he could not appear on the "Prime Time" programme.

An Ceann Comhairle

I call Deputy Rabbitte.

Mr. O’Dea

I am a man who can only do so much.

(Interruptions).

An Ceann Comhairle

Allow Deputy Rabbitte to speak without interruption.

Mr. Rabbitte

It is very difficult to draw any conclusion from what the Taoiseach has said. On the one hand there is no problem — the queues last 15 minutes. On the other hand the airport will soon have 60 million passengers so we need a third terminal before we get a second one. I have heard of leap-frogging a generation but never a terminal. We will have the third before we can agree on the second. We still have no clarity about the positions taken by the Taoiseach and his partners in Government. As I understand it, the Tánaiste is firmly behind Ryanair and Mr. O'Leary. The Taoiseach, on the other hand, is nodding and winking to the trade unions and his local organisation that he might do this and may well do that and that he could build a third terminal before a second.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy's minute is concluded.

Mr. Rabbitte

There are impossible queues at peak time and there is the prospect of a summer of aggravation for people trying to get through Dublin Airport. It is a simple, straightforward infrastructural decision that the Government ought to have made years ago. When does the Taoiseach propose that we have a decision? Does he have any idea, especially if the Cabinet met on the matter this morning, what the obstacles are to arriving at and announcing a decision? The Taoiseach tried to dismiss 30 projects selected last night——

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy's time is long since concluded.

Mr. Rabbitte

——but that is the great part of the road building that has gone on here. Given the global figure of projects estimated to cost €6 billion and ending up costing €18 billion, there is no more defence for it than for the superloo in Longford town, each flush of which costs €8.

An Ceann Comhairle

I ask the Deputy to give way to the Taoiseach.

The Taoiseach

I will not return to road works since I have only a minute to answer. The position is that the present terminal caters for 20 million passengers.

Ms O. Mitchell

Who says? It does not.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Deputy will have to leave the House if she does not desist.

(Interruptions).

An Ceann Comhairle

The Taoiseach is entitled to exactly the same courtesy in answering a question that Deputy Rabbitte received, and Deputy Rabbitte is entitled to hear the answer in silence. I appeal to Members to allow the Taoiseach to speak without interruption.

The Taoiseach

The present terminal can deal with 20 million passengers, and we know that Dublin Airport is growing rapidly. It requires a second terminal by 2009 to be a modern, efficient, properly run and flexible terminal that can cater for its fast-growing needs.

Mr. S. Ryan

The Tánaiste is losing out.

The Taoiseach

That is what we want to provide in Dublin Airport. Pier D is required by 2009.

Mr. Allen

What for?

The Taoiseach

It is to cater for 20 million passengers.

An Ceann Comhairle

Deputy Allen is not a member of the Labour Party, and this is Deputy Rabbitte's question. In fairness to the Labour Party, there should be silence for the answer.

The Taoiseach

When we announce the decision, I hope that the House's support will be as full as its interest has been.

Mr. Sargent

The Taoiseach has to answer after last night's "Prime Time" programme about the overruns. I will not ask him again as I have attempted to ask him before. Are we not witnessing the biggest abuse of taxpayers' money in the history of the State? Will he explain, given the international research carried out, how the Government can stand by after receiving a national roads needs study, effectively sidelining it and cooking up an ad hoc notion not to upgrade the roads, as the study from the NRA specified, but to replace them with motorways? Last night’s example was Clare to Mitchelstown, with 10,000 vehicles a day, which is to get a motorway with a capacity of 55,000. Where is the financial or traffic management logic in such a plan?

How has this trick been allowed to become systematic? A bid is made at a price low enough to gain political support and when it is accepted, claims are maximised to ensure that the cost overrun is not 20%, the international average, but 86%. Will the Taoiseach explain on that basis? We are talking about cost and finance. It makes no sense from a traffic management point of view. We all know that we need roads, and the national roads needs study pointed out how they were to be provided. Will the Taoiseach explain how that was ditched and the motorway plan put in its place?

An Ceann Comhairle

The time is concluded.

Mr. Sargent

It was not a plan as it arose only at Government level and not from the National Roads Authority. How has that cost overrun been allowed to continue? Will the Taoiseach halt that and review the national roads plan so that we can return to some financial common sense?

The Taoiseach

Deputy Sargent knows that a few years ago the NRA totally changed the systems and structure it was operating for roads, designing them in a very loose way rather than producing detailed plans. Then, when high specifications were put in, costs were far higher. I explained that to the House several years ago based on what had been happening.

Since then, there has been far more accurate costing. The cost estimation control and procurement procedures in the NRA were changed and the designs have been far more accurate. It is now producing more detailed designs from an early stage, which is the right way to do it. It has made greater and more efficient use of the cost-effective "design and build" lump-sum, fixed-price contracts. That is why we have seen projects such as the Monasterevin bypass and now the Kinnegad road coming in under contract and on time. Those systems were not operated before. A specialist has also been appointed who reviews all the cost estimates. That was not the position previously. Tender and system outturn costs have been benchmarked. Design and construction standards have been established through publication of NRA specifications on road works. All those initiatives have been developed over the past few years.

Mr. Boyle

Who will take responsibility?

An Ceann Comhairle

I ask Deputy Boyle to allow the Taoiseach to speak without interruption.

The Taoiseach

We are now spending €2 billion a year on roads, and a few years ago we did not have the structures to deal with that. We brought expertise into the NRA——

Mr. Gormley

Incompetence.

The Taoiseach

——from Ireland, around Europe and South Africa. All those systems are now in place, leading to far more cost-effective contracts. We had other delays as a result of planning issues and other problems. During the initial years, as highlighted in the contracts, there was 40% inflation on them. That was the major part of contracts in the past. The system is now far better, with much more resources, and it is leading to a much better position. I do not know if Deputy Sargent is asking us to change the roads plan.

Mr. Sargent

To return to it.

The Taoiseach

The roads plan is built into a ten-year programme and we are delivering on that. The Deputy has seen how many schemes there are. There are 19 this year, and 15 or 16 were finished last year. It is developing a far better roads structure in the country than we have ever had.

Mr. Sargent

The Taoiseach referred to inflation, but I referred to the cost overrun after inflation. If one wished to include inflation, it would be even worse. The overrun after inflation was found to be 86%.

The Taoiseach has still not answered my question about whether he accepts that it is right and proper that a plan presented as costing €5.6 billion is now estimated to cost up to €18 billion or, as some people say, €20 billion. Is that acceptable? As head of the Government, does the Taoiseach have any sense that a mistake was made when the national roads needs study was effectively binned? What we have instead is a motorway plan that is not rooted in sound traffic or financial management. That has been proven, and it is not we who are saying it; it has been said internationally. Might the Taoiseach at least have some pause for thought and halt the signing of contracts for the toll roads, which will make enormous profits for private builders over the heads and at the cost of taxpayers for years? Will he at least halt those contracts and investigate where the financial management commonsense has gone? Will the Government put this commonsense back into the plan and reincorporate the national roads needs study?

Mr. Cullen

Deputy Sargent should get off his bicycle and try driving on the roads.

(Interruptions).

An Ceann Comhairle

The Taoiseach should be allowed to respond without interruption.

Mr. D. Ahern

Deputy Sargent did not object to roads development in Balbriggan.

Mr. O’Dowd

The Ceann Comhairle should remove the Ministers for Transport and Foreign Affairs from the Chamber.

An Ceann Comhairle

I ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs to allow the Taoiseach to respond.

The Taoiseach

There has been a number of independent evaluations. Both Fitzpatricks and Associates and Indecon have acknowledged the NRA is generally well managed as regards those factors within its control. There are factors outside the control of the NRA.

Mr. Boyle

One of these factors is the absurd economic policies of the Government.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Taoiseach is responding to a question from the leader of Deputy Boyle's party and should be allowed to continue without interruption.

The Taoiseach

We will not get into the issues outside the authority's control.

Deputy Sargent has quoted figures in regard to the roads programme. The Deputy is well aware this was a particular programme for a limited number of roads. It was expanded significantly over several years and there are now 68 projects involving the construction of 120 km of roadway and almost 120 km of dual carriageway around the country.

Mr. Gogarty

This construction was over-priced.

The Taoiseach

The early schemes for control of these projects were obviously not adequate. This is why the NRA has strengthened its cost estimation and control procedures in the past five years. A figure of 86% was mentioned in last night's television programme, as quoted by Deputy Sargent. However, 40% of this was inflation. The report of the Committee of Public Accounts offers a full breakdown of the figures. Some 40% was accounted for by inflation and 16% was due to the failure to cost certain elements at the planning stage.

Mr. Eamon Ryan

There was 100% bungling.

An Ceann Comhairle

The Taoiseach should be allowed to continue without interruption.

The Taoiseach

Some 20% was due to modifications in scope where architectural changes were made to projects and 24% was a consequence of project-specific increases such as those relating to the tunnel, the south-eastern motorway and the Glen of the Downs.

Mr. Boyle

Will the Government remove the tolls?

The Taoiseach

These were changes the local authorities and the NRA made in the design of projects.

Mr. J. O’Keeffe

What about the Minister who wasted €30 million on an electronic voting system?

An Ceann Comhairle

The Taoiseach should be allowed to respond without interruption.

The Taoiseach

The NRA has introduced new cost-effective methods and procurement practices which ensure the new design-build projects are coming in on time and under cost. This was not the case before.

Mr. Gogarty

What about the M50?

Mr. Gormley

What about the tolls? Will the Taoiseach answer the question?