Castlebar Town Councillor Harry Barrett has labelled as “short-sighted” a decision by Government to halt planned spending on almost 80 national road-building schemes, worth billions of euro, until further notice. Four schemes between Longford and Westport on the N5 will be affected along with four other schemes on the N13, N14, and N15 group of roads in the northwest.
Barrett issued his statement in the wake of a letter from Government issued to the National Roads Authority late last month. Under it, the NRA is forbidden from spending on all capital projects which are not already under way unless each new project is individually sanctioned by the Department of Finance.
The curb will also extend to road maintenance where contracts for items such as road resurfacing will also need to be pre-approved by the Department of Finance.
Barrett stated: “If we had a Government that was concerned with regional development the NRA would move ahead with all improvement schemes on our national primary routes. These improvements are badly needed to attract industry into this county and for the people who pay the same road tax as those living in Dublin. However, Mayo has not been spared. We will now see our national primary routes neglected until further notice. This decision is very short-sighted and counter productive.”
The instruction to the NRA reflects that given to local authorities ordering them to stop €500 million worth of work on regional and local roads, pending approval of each scheme from the Department.
