Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

JobPath, Turas Nua, or whatever it is. They all have fancy names. The bottom line is that it has been the ruination of community and voluntary groups in my area. If somebody is in JobPath, Turas Nua or whatever we call it, that person is firstly taken off the live register but still does not have a job. Secondly, that person cannot take a community employment, CE, job, a rural social scheme, RSS, job or a Tús job, while he or she is involved in Turas Nua, which could go on for a year or two. That is a huge issue in my area, and in other rural communities. It was brought up in the Dáil last week. In a city, one might get away with that since there is a huge population of people and there might be a high proportion of unemployed, so other people can be found.

In a rural community, there are gifted people that may have lost jobs and may have opportunities on an RSS, Tús or CE scheme, but cannot take them because they have been sucked in by this new JobPath. It looks nice for the live register figures, but the bottom line is that unemployment is still very high in west Cork and I can only speak on behalf of west Cork. It is still very high in my own community. That is a matter that the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs should look into. I am not saying that JobPath should not be there. One should still be entitled to go onto an RSS, CE or a Tús scheme while in JobPath, until JobPath finds a person gainful employment. If it does, that is a different thing.

That is something that needs to be looked at because it is a big issue for rural Ireland at the moment. It is a big issue for the community and voluntary groups which kept this country rolling on. They are not going to find a workforce for the meals on wheels or to carry out the Tidy Towns work, or whatever. I welcome the Minister's initiative here on rates, an issue for businesses in rural Ireland, because that has been a disastrous situation for a lot of people trying to start businesses in small rural towns and villages. They find it very difficult and rate are killing them. We will see how that rolls out and we welcome it for the time being.

I came in late, but I heard no mention of post offices. I have extreme worries about the future of our rural post offices, which are the lifeline of the local area. Rural roads were mentioned. I come from a community that has seen very little investment in our roads. There was mention of motorways; the nearest motorway to me is about two hours drive from a peninsula. I would leave in the morning, sometimes at 2 a.m. or 3 a.m.; there is not even an initiative there to create passing bays to open up west Cork as a place of business, this is what we need. We need better investment for our roads.

The Minister speaks about farmers, they are going through a very difficult period. Yes, some of it is weather related which is nothing to do with the Minister personally, we accept, but there are things out there such as the GLAS payments. More than 8,000 farmers have not received a GLAS payment yet, and we are told for the last three to four months, and any TD here is probably getting it in the neck in their constituency offices, it is due to a technical issue. For the love of God, somebody needs to have a head roll there and be put out of their job if they cannot resolve a technical issue to give farmers their payment. These farmers are in a situation where they cannot pay banks and cannot pay contractors. The grain farmers have had no compensation package put in place although there has been a lot of talk, and it was voted for in the Dáil. These are the issues. I do not want to preach negativity but these are the facts on the ground.

On mobile phone coverage and broadband issues, we are talking about 2020, 2021. I am sorry but the people in west Cork, Mayo or wherever want that issue resolved now. I encouraged and supported an initiative between the Minister and the communications Minister, Deputy Naughten about these mobile phone repeaters and it needs to be researched quickly and both of the Ministers need to bring in the mobile phone companies and make them accountable because they are not accountable to anybody. We are doing a lot of talking but nothing is happening. Details of some initiative on mobile phone repeaters were e-mailed to us. It is a brilliant idea for rural communities which do not have a mobile phone service; it was done with broadband many years ago so it can be done with mobile phones. I think it was an initiative of Deputy Naughten's but Deputy Humphreys was involved as well. I just hope to God this plan works or is seen to work in some way.

The Leader funding is not rolled out. It was the backbone of many rural communities. There is no money available at this time. In west Cork we use to have one company, now we have three and nobody seems to know who is running what, it is a pure farce. The Minister's ear is worn from me saying that so I will not annoy her more with that today. When these things are being rolled out, I would like to see who is calling the shots.

We pushed very hard for the programme for Government to have extra jobs in the rural social scheme, which is a very good scheme for low income fishermen and low income farmers. We got 500 jobs. That was brilliant because it was the first time anything had happened in a number of years. Then it rolled out. Cork County is a huge county and it got only 39 extra jobs. I apologise to Deputy Ring if I insult his county, but there were 79 Mayo. That is not good enough. Who is pulling strings here? The bottom line is that it should be fair across the board. In one company alone in West Cork Development Partnership, we could have had 40 people but the whole of Cork County only get 39. I presume other counties will be complaining too that they did not get enough. I question things at times. I come from rural Ireland, my heart is embedded deeply therE. That is what brought me into Dáil Éireann and I will fight my corner for my people as long as I can and if this plan works, I will be in here to praise it. Not everything can work, I accept that, but aspects such as rural broadband and mobile phone coverage are major issues and if we want to create employment in rural Ireland that is the way forward.