CIF calls for sector ministerial office

A SPECIFIC ministerial office for the construction industry needs to be established in recognition of its “essential role” to the economy, according to the sector’s main representative body.

The Construction Industry Federation (CIF) has called on the Government to adopt a more enterprise-focused approach towards the sector and recognise that it still has a major role to play in the domestic economy.

Earlier this year, the CIF criticised the Government for risking further damage to the economy by failing to have a national construction plan in place and cutting investment in the sector. The representative body also forecast that the number of jobs lost in the construction sector could exceed 320,000 by the end of this year.

Yesterday, the CIF published a submission paper addressed to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, outlining its suggestions for the Government’s current Public Capital Programme, which runs until 2014.

In it, the body suggests the establishment of “alternative funding mechanisms” to help deliver vital projects that can’t be financed within existing Exchequer budgets; the sale of certain State assets and toll-charges for all of the country’s existing motorway network.

“Those who suggest the Public Capital Programme should, or even could, be cut further should look beyond the spin attached to Ireland’s infrastructure investment plans,” according to Martin Whelan, the CIF’s director of communications, policy and research.

“Capital investment has accounted for nearly a third of the expenditure cuts since Ireland went into recession, despite comprising only a fraction of overall spending by the Government. The existing Programme envisages a 60% reduction in Exchequer capital investment in 2014 from the peak in 2008; lowering funding below 2% of GDP, well below the European average. When you strip away the non-construction and infrastructure elements of the programme and the inevitable close-out payments for capital works that are completed, the budget for new projects — including education, health, transportation, water, energy and telecommunications is significantly less than these headline figures suggest.”

The CIF is seeking a meeting with Mr Howlin to discuss its submission.