NTR owed State almost €2m

National Toll Roads: The State was underpaid almost €2 million by National Toll Roads (NTR) for 2002 and 2003, the Comptroller and Auditor General's annual report states.

The miscalculation occurred because the State was paying a "shadow toll" for cars using the West-Link, to ensure toll rate rises due to NTR were kept to a minimum.

As revealed in The Irish Times earlier this year, the State paid National Toll Roads more than €6 million in toll support in 2002 and 2003 to forgo toll rises during the construction period of the second bridge.

But the Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) found this amount should have been counted by National Toll Roads as part of its gross toll revenue. This would have ensured the State's share of revenue from West-Link was greater by just over €1.8 million. In addition the C&AG found that rounding the compensation payment per car to the nearest cent "resulted in a further underpayment of €171,000".

The error was not identified by NTR, its auditors, the National Roads Authority or the Department of Transport. The department said last night all the money plus interest had been repaid.

The C&AG also states that while the State and NTR have shared more than €310 million in revenue from the West-Link bridge, the final cost to the public is likely to be in the region of €1.76 billion.

Analysing the operation and cost of the West-Link, the C&AG's report shows that the State had invested about €1.1 billion by 2004, building the M50 to each side of the bridge.

The C&AG also found toll charges paid by West-Link users would amount to about €1.1 billion over the 30-year period 1990 to 2020, excluding VAT.

This gives a total cost of the M50 of €2.2 billion from which the State is set to recoup €0.44 billion in shares of tolls, rates and corporation tax.

The C&AG says that "broadly speaking", there are two options available to the State: reducing or freezing the tolls, or abolishing them. However, if the tolls were reduced or frozen, the State must compensate NTR for the shortfall in toll revenue.