Brendan Griffin (Kerry, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am from a peripheral county, Kerry. We did not have the M7 from Portlaoise to Adare until 2010. The one thing that always struck me while travelling the regular single-lane route was the number of crosses and headstones along the old N7. It was absolutely frightening. It is now a nice journey because one gets on the motorway and off one goes. I very much feel the witnesses' pain as once one gets to Adare, it will take at least another hour and a half to get to the Dingle peninsula.

Looking at the figures compiled for the north west and the midlands in terms of investment and jobs, there is definitely a correlation between accessibility and reducing peripherality. It is two-way traffic. It opens up the jobs market of the east to people who are resident in that location and also potential investors encountering that lack of infrastructure totally diminishes an the opportunity for an area to get-----