Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We are approaching the development of a city-state in this country. London has 13% of the population of Britain. At present, Dublin county has 38% of the population of the State and, probably in the lifetime of our generation, this is going to increase to 50%. At that point, the country will become a city-state. That is not what one wants to develop. In Denmark, the town of Aarhus was created and it had a population of 70,000. The Danish authorities realised that there was an over-concentration of population and economic activity in Copenhagen. They realised that they needed to create some level of critical mass elsewhere that would be internationally attractive in the context of demand, etc. They solved the problem by population disruption.

Ms Graham mentioned the location of land for development where existing transport infrastructure exists. In the main, such infrastructure exists where the current over-concentration of population is happening.