Road Network
Seanad Éireann — 2026-09-30
============================================================

Catherine Ardagh (FF), Dublin South-Central

I appreciate the Senator's comments. I will make sure to bring these back to the Minister for Transport. I assure the Senator and the House that the Government is fully committed to the protection and renewal of our road network. Our vast interconnected road network is essential in connecting people, businesses and communities, so we must continue to protect it. As such, the Department of Transport allocates significant funding towards regional and local road maintenance and improvement each year. For those grant types, the focus is on road strengthening and sealing and the allocation of funding is based on the length of roads in local authorities, the objective being to allocate funding to eligible local authorities on a just basis, keeping protection and renewal of the road network to the fore. The Department believes this methodology is both fair and transparent and ensures that local authorities with the highest quantum of roads receive the highest level of available funding. This best ensures the greatest amount of our roads receive funding for continued maintenance and improvement.
Furthermore, the Department works closely with all local authorities throughout the year, and at year end reviews any additional expenditure that may have been incurred by the local authorities under the regional local grant schemes. Where possible, the Department apportions funds to this additional expenditure. All funding under the regional and local roads grant programme was allocated in February 2026. Both Cavan and Monaghan County Councils received a significant amount under the available protection and renewal grants. Through this €718 million investment in the regional and local road grant programme this year, the Minister for Transport ensures the Government's continuing commitment to the restoration and maintenance of our road infrastructure. I thank the Senator for the opportunity to discuss this matter on behalf of the Minister for Transport.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-09-30/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:00:59+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-30