David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with Deputy Ring.

As colleagues have pointed out, there are a lot of community schemes, including the RRDF, the town and village renewable scheme, CLÁR, the outdoor recreation infrastructure scheme and so on. The difference these schemes make in communities is amazing. Communities are the heart and centre of rural Ireland. There is no doubt about that. In our villages, towns and cities, people often come together voluntarily to undertake a project for which they must raise funds. It is fantastic when the Government can provide much of the funding. It might not be able to give all the money but it can provide a large part of what is needed to make these projects happen. That makes a massive difference in communities. Sometimes the funding involved is small, as colleagues have set out, and sometimes it is quite large. For instance, more than €4 million has been granted to Youghal library. It is an amazing project but it has not started yet. I am a bit impatient to see it get going. There is a lot of work involved in design, planning and all the rest of it, but the €4 million is sitting there as we wait for that to be done.

The regeneration of town centres is hugely important. There is nothing worse than going to a town and seeing a lot of shops empty and boarded up. More than €250,000 has been made available for the Youghal town centre regeneration project. It will make a massive difference. The same is true in Fermoy, to which €1.5 million has been allocated to rejuvenate the town centre. I could give more examples. We all must fight for our own areas. The smaller funding can also make a massive difference. It can be used for upgrading walkways, pathways and so on. That makes a difference to people locally.

There may be areas in our country that do not have community organisations. Will the Minister ask her officials to see whether there are pockets that do not have such activity? As I am sure colleagues will agree, if an area has a dynamic and well-supported community council, it can move mountains. Such councils can get a great deal of stuff done, including working with the local authority to bring forward projects. Many such projects come from the ground up, progressed by people living locally and who know their area. They go to the local authority to say they want to get something done. The local authority works with them to put a proposal to the Department.

The economy is going well and that means money can be made available to communities. This is a result of the Government's policies. People should acknowledge, recognise and celebrate that. I am around long enough to remember when we had no money in this country. We were really poor and had nothing at all. Ireland is now a vibrant place. As colleagues across the way have said more than once, we are one of the richest countries in the world. We are in a position now to put this funding into our communities.

Deputy Berry is dead right in what he said about remote working hubs. There are 319 hubs now in operation across the country, with a target of more than 400. Remote working means people do not have to travel long distances, thereby saving on diesel, petrol or, in the case of electric cars, charging costs. People can stay in their own community, village or town. They can come out their front door, walk down the street and go into the remote working hub to do their work rather than having to drive 20 km, 30 km or 40 km to a city or other location. They are also saving time and their quality of life is improved.

It is all about quality of life. That is what the Minister has been promoting as she travels the country meeting people, talking about projects and funding those projects. I ask her to keep that going as long as possible. A lot of work has been completed. Our vibrant communities are identifying more and more projects and bringing them forward. Most of the projects are being accepted, funded, grant-aided and supported by the Government. That is what needs to be done. We need to build our communities. The Muintir na Tíre community councils in rural areas do fantastic work. We must build them up and support the energy and dynamism of the volunteers who are often the people to identify projects locally. They know what works for their communities and what will make a difference. These projects are making a difference.

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