The prospect of the National Development Plan being completed on time was in doubt last night after the Minister for Finance warned there may not be enough money to carry it out.
Mr McCreevy said it was his goal to let the key elements of the seven-year NDP proceed on time, particularly major roads and public transport projects, but in the current economic climate it was uncertain.
"It was a seven-year plan and the plan is flexible enough to be able to adapt. If someone could predict for me exactly what things would be like in January 2003 then I'll make the decision now. But say for the latter half of next year we saw things in a different light - then further expenditures can be planned," he said on RT╔'s This Week programme.
Asked if he intended taking the advice being offered from some quarters that the Government should borrow for the December Budget, Mr McCreevy said: "I'm certainly not going to the extreme of the argument until we see how things are going to pan out. This time next year we will see who has been correct in their prognosis for 2002. . .I think we would not be forgiven for putting us on a course that if we find out at the end of next year that this has been more prolonged than people anticipated."
He said he was going to be as tight as he possibly could be in the Budget. "It is very important to face up to the realities of what is there. The reality is that the world economy is slowed down, the Irish economy is slowed down. We don't want to pretend that it is not happening because that is what we did in the 1970s, and as a result of pretending there was no crisis we made foolish decisions that took us the best part of 20 years to unravel.
"This Government is not going to do anything in the Budget or into the future that is going to put that at risk."
He said he would not have a budget that would give people "a fortnight's great expectations and 10 years of misery".
"I am going to err on the side of caution," he said.