Confidence among Dublin’s business community in the Government’s ability to deliver on its promises is slipping, according to a new report by Dublin Chamber.
The Chamber’s Q3 Business Outlook Report reveals widespread scepticism about progress on key issues such as housing, infrastructure, and economic leadership.
The largest share of respondents — 41% — rated Government performance as only “fair”, describing “limited but visible effort.”
Nearly four-in-ten firms (38%) said the Government was falling well short on most of its commitments, while almost a third (31%) rated performance as “poor” and 7% as “very poor.”
By contrast, fewer than one-in-five businesses offered a positive verdict, with 17% describing progress as “good” and just 1% as “excellent.”
Housing remains the defining test of Government credibility, with more than half (52%) of businesses naming it as the top priority for delivery.
That was followed by transport and infrastructure (44%) and overall economic leadership (41%).
Aebhric McGibney, Director of Public and International Affairs at Dublin Chamber, said businesses urgently need to see action, not announcements.
“Businesses need to see tangible progress from Government in removing the barriers and delays to building housing and providing water, electricity and transport,” he said.
“They need to see delivery at the scale and pace required by a housing crisis.”
Mr McGibney noted that Budget 2026 “mostly reannounced commitments from the revised National Development Plan,” saying that while funding announcements were welcome, they must now be “followed up by action.”
“We need to see the critical projects that will unlock housing delivery, such as the Eastern and Midlands Water Supply Project and the Greater Dublin Drainage scheme, move off the page and into construction,” he said.
To clear the logjam, he added, the Government must “balance the public good appropriately with individual rights, agree multi-annual budgets to give certainty to the market, and make parallel consenting the norm rather than the sequential process that is in place at present.”