I also share in the sympathy for Kim Damti's family. For a young woman of 22 years of age to lose her life in such a tragic way is horrific.

I ask the Tánaiste about one of his Ministers ignoring Transport Infrastructure Ireland's, TII, data on spending funds on restructuring roads and maintenance of existing roads. The Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, decided against it even though his Department has full data that show the number of fatalities that will be caused if funds are not spent on the national road networks. This is also reflected in our local county councils not being able to repair or resurface roads. One reason is the local authorities cannot get staff. I had engineers contact me during the week saying they cannot retain staff, even within the county councils, for the road networks, and they cannot get the funding to resurface roads and do basic repairs on them for safety.

We also have concerns on the road network about cutting hedges for health and safety of lives. The Wildlife Acts tell us that we cannot cut certain hedges on roadsides. We now have our transport network of buses, trucks and cars travelling in the middle of roads because if a local authority goes to repair a road, it is allowed to cut 1 m in and 2 m up. What happens? The hedgerow heads for the centre. Where are the mirrors on a bus? Up at 2 m. Where are the mirrors on a truck? Up at 2 m. They can no longer pull in on our road networks. Bus Éireann came back and said that it has to have buses with fewer seats to travel the roads because its buses are too big, because we are not allowed to cut the hedges on our roadsides for the protection of pedestrians, cyclists, bus networks and basic travel.

When county councils put up signage, under their own legal requirements, the signs have to be a metre off the road to allow for mirrors and things to pass for safety, but our roads are closing in. With all the statistics the Minister had from TII on our road networks, he refused to spend the budget it asked him to spend on upgrading our road network for the health and safety of all vehicle users.

I thank the Deputy for raising the issue. It is worth pointing out that since 2020, the Government has invested €5.17 billion in all road infrastructure, including new roads and the protection and maintenance of existing infrastructure.

That was the past three years.

The priority is the delivery of a network that is safe and robust. In respect of the protection and renewal programme for existing roads, TII has safety as its priority, as do the Minister, Deputy Ryan, and the Minister of State, Deputy Chambers. Inflation has eaten into the budget. The Government sanctioned and approved the construction of the N5 Ballaghaderreen to Scramoge road project. I ask the Deputy to look at the dramatic inflationary increase in the cost of that road from the original time it was mooted to where it is now. Nonetheless, we sanctioned it and it will go ahead.

The more fundamental point from a safety point of view is that, for the first nine months of 2023, approximately two thirds of fatalities on the road network have occurred on non-national roads, so we are very conscious of safety. Speed is still the big killer on our roads and we need to acknowledge that. This year, about €491 million of Exchequer capital funding was provided for national roads, for both protection and renewal, and new roads through Transport Infrastructure Ireland. Some €120 million was provided using public private partnerships and so forth.

I do not think we can blame the policy on hedges for this. Biodiversity is important. We need balance. It has been quite successful. What has happened in the past two years has been far more successful in respect of the protection of hedgerows, which we also need as a society for-----

And our roadsides?

-----balanced development and maintenance of nature, which then helps us all to survive.

There is a hedge in between them.

I am asking about the roads.

The hedges are not really a factor in road deaths and safety on our roads. There is a significant issue here and there has to be an holistic approach, covering all aspects, including structural adjustments to roads and improvements to road structures.

Ministers are looking at that in respect of allocations specifically to road restructuring in order to make certain roads and locations safer. That is important.

Again, the Tánaiste did not listen to the question. I was on about roadside hedges. I am all for biodiversity. All the other hedges that are inside can grow. I am talking about roadsides and the protection of people who travel on them.

It has emerged that the Minister for Transport, Deputy Eamon Ryan, was warned last year that the failure to properly invest in new road projects and improvements on roads would result in 77 deaths and 381 serious injuries over the next five years. There was a shocking €88 million reduction in budget 2022, and a further reduction of €113 million in 2023, in relevant funding. The Tánaiste talked about all the investments that are being done, but TII has said exactly what the number of deaths over the next five years will be. One death over the next five years would be a lot. The Tánaiste talked about taking the advice of professionals.

To go back to road infrastructure, I want all hedges on roads to be 1 m in and straight up. Biodiversity can live inside that. When we then hit the ditches, we will not be destroying hedgerows, wildlife or biodiversity, which the Tánaiste referenced. I am here to save lives. We are here to save lives; it is common sense.

So am I, Deputy. I first came into government in 1997. There were 472 road deaths in Ireland that year. We saw a reduction to 137 in 2021. That was massive progress. There was a lot of opposition to the many measures that it took to bring road deaths down to 137. There was a lot of opposition in the House to then Minister for Transport, Noel Dempsey, and others who earned the wrath of many Deputies who said he could not do this or that. He did it, however, with the Road Safety Authority, RSA, and the late Gay Byrne. It was not palatable in the Chamber but the figures spoke for themselves. As soon as there was any talk in the past two to three months about moderation of speed limits, it happened again straight out. I challenge the Deputy, if one or two unpalatable measures came out in respect of how we could get road deaths down again, that he might have a different tune and would attack the Minister for daring to do this to rural Ireland. I am as committed as the Deputy is to road safety, but it took a lot of difficult political choices to get to the better position we are in. We have now gone backwards-----

But the funding-----

-----in terms of the numbers this year in that 136 people have been killed on our roads. That is a rise. We have to reflect. It took many measures and many different approaches. We now need the same approach to deal with it.