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LAST TIME OUT – back in 2021 – the government’s National Development Plan ran to 189 pages.
Today’s document setting out the list of infrastructure projects the current coalition hopes to deliver over the next decade comes in at just under 50 pages and is rather scant on detail.
The NDP is the government’s long-term plan for what large-scale infrastructure projects will be needed in Ireland over the next five to ten years.
Numbers in the billions were bandied about by the Taoiseach, Tánaiste and Minister of State Sean Canney as they announced the plan at Government Buildings, but details on the top projects, the timescale and how they will delivered, were thin on the ground.
There was no mention of road projects, new hospitals, or specific schools that were going to be built. They only real specific mention was that the MetroLink was getting fully funded, but the government still doesn’t know how much it will cost.
Instead of providing a list of projects, Taoiseach Micheál Martin said each line minister had a body of work to do over the next couple of weeks.
Those various ministers will come back and outline their priorities and what they can do with the money allocated to them “closer to the budget”, which has been confirmed for October.
Interesting timing.
The Journal asked if pushing out the departmental announcements is an attempt to distract the public with shiny capital spending announcements ahead of what is expected to be a lacklustre budget, particularly for workers.
The Taoiseach’s response?
He said the previous NDP in previous years was “too big a document, if I’m frank”.
He outlined how each minister will now have to prioritise the projects they want to get over the line.
“They have work to do within the department in terms of prioritising the allocation of that funding and prioritisation is going to be key.”
He denied there was any attempt to distract the public.
“I mean, this is concrete substance in terms of investment in projects, be it roads, in active travel, be it in third level education, be it in research projects, the people receiving that funding won’t see it as a distraction. They’ll see it as very real.”
Martin said today’s slimmed down document with little detail was the “right approach”, in his view.
Similarly, the Tánaiste said in the past, there has been a “big rush” to publish the NDP, which included a “long list of projects”.
“We’ve tried to do things differently here. We’ve tried to provide ministers and their senior officials with certainty as to the envelope of money that they have for the next five years. And now we’re telling them to go back and look through and tell us what can be delivered and the pace in which it can be delivered.
“We have to be agile in relation to this. You know, when it comes to capital projects, you might have two projects. One gets planning quicker than the other. We have to provide people, I think, with the flexibility here on what can be delivered quickly and ensure that value for money,” said Harris.
Public Expenditure Minister Jack Chambers also defended the document today, stating that he never intended to publish a long list of detailed projects.
While the Taoiseach denied that departmental announcements in the run up to the budget were a form of distraction to keep the focus off budget measures, such a tactic would not be a surprise move.
Why? There was a stark warning from government ministers today that October’s budget projections could be built on sand.
After the NDP was launched today, the government also published its Summer Economic Statement (SES), which outlines the parameters for the upcoming Budget.
While in previous years there has been talk of ‘bumper budgets’ and once-off measures, there was no such talk today.
Instead, the budget spending pot was revealed under a cloud of uncertainty.
While this could in fact be a very large budget, in terms of increased spending on last year, the Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe cautioned that a “deterioration in the tariff landscape” would result in a “recalibration” of its €9.4 billion Budget 2026 package announced today.
The paper also stated there will be a €1.5 billion taxation package, essentially tax cut measures.
However, this could be gobbled up if the hospitality VAT rate is reduced from 13.5% to 9% at a cost of €1 billion. The finance minister confirmed that there will be “trade-offs” where other tax cuts might not get the green light due to the hospitality VAT cut.
Donohoe also confirmed that the SES published today is based on the workings that there will be 0% tariffs between the EU and the US.
Yes, you read that right. Zero per cent.
This is despite Tánaiste Simon Harris and other senior ministers stating that a 10% tariff is “baked in” to government projections… just not for the budget package projection published today it would seem.
Essentially, the SES published today is not worth the paper it is written on as no-one in government is working to the optimistic view that Trump will roll over on tariffs.
If anything, the predictions are the landing zone could be above the 10%.
Hocus pocus projections and fantasy figures are how the SES projections published today could be described.
Even amid the economic uncertainty that comes with the ongoing standoff over tariffs, capital spending will be protected, the Taoiseach said, stating that “current spending would be under pressure”.
“Our budget day decisions could change,” if the global uncertainty does come to pass, Donohoe said today.
Chambers said the government will “absolutely have to revisit” the €9.3bn budget allocation “if there is a deterioration”.
All this points to a strategy of delaying ‘good news’ infrastructure announcements until the autumn – by which point, presumably, we’ll have a better idea of how grim the economic situation is looking.
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