Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Parnell for his presentation. The action plan is fairly clear as to goals and objectives. In the area of flood relief, I compliment the Office of Public Works, OPW, and officials on taking on the amendments I instigated to the minor works scheme, which is very important to rural Ireland. It will help more flood schemes to be done as they will be better able to satisfy cost-benefit analyses. Flooding is becoming increasingly prevalent, as we have seen in the past couple of weeks in Donegal and Laois. The home relocation scheme is another very important aspect of rural Ireland for people for whom no other engineering solution can be found. The Department is working very closely with the OPW to meet the concerns of rural people in this area.

Last Saturday week, I had the honour of opening a new men's shed in Athenry, and I met many people who are involved in men's sheds in east Galway. These are one of the most positive things I have seen happening in the regions. Men come together to discuss things, to carry out projects and invest back into the community in the form of services which would otherwise not be provided. I would like the Department to provide more support in the form of funding, because the regional organisers of the men's sheds do it without payment and this is not sustainable going forward. There are more than 400 and I would like to see a structure put in place to support them. They are getting their governance right but it is important to recognise the asset we have in the men's shed concept by continuing to support it and grow it.

Mr. Parnell mentioned the Atlantic economic corridor and it is of paramount importance that we push it for the sake of balanced regional development and rural western constituencies. It needs to be highlighted in the national planning framework and I understand the Department has made submissions in this respect. The Atlantic economic corridor is the future for Ireland, and not just for rural Ireland, because there is overdevelopment on the east coast and a poor quality of life, with people unable to live and work on account of the expense and the congestion. We need to create a counterbalance, and the key ingredient for the cities in an arc from Cork, Limerick, Galway and Sligo up to Derry and Belfast is infrastructure. In modern Ireland this includes roads, railways, connectivity, broadband, water and wastewater, and these need to be developed to create jobs. Mr. Parnell mentioned the need for parishes to field a team of 15 footballers and we need young people who are getting married and having families to be able to live and work in their parishes and communities. The western rail corridor is a very significant component of that, and to realise our full potential we need to close the gap between Claremorris and Athenry, and to look at linking the rail network to Shannon Airport and Knock Airport. It does not take billions to do these things and the cost of bridging the gap between Claremorris and Athenry would be less than €100 million, which is not a lot in the context of overall public spending on transport. We need to work with the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport to ensure this agenda is kept to the fore and that funding, rather than just a plan, is provided.

Another important area is broadband, and the Minister, Deputy Naughten, is working on the national broadband plan and the broadband tender. I am sure all members will agree that the current roll-out of broadband is intermittent and divisive and is causing stress and consternation by being rolled out to sections of road and communities in a haphazard basis. There is no equality and it is creating a huge amount of division in communities. The broadband providers say they do not have the juice in the lines to bring them another half a mile up the road, and business in rural Ireland cannot access them as a result, even though they can see it on a pole down the road. I was at a meeting the other night in Knockdoe and the 30 people there said that one of their main problems was broadband. Ten years ago it would have been bad roads or potholes but broadband is right up there as an issue now. It is not so much that there is none of it but that there is some of it and it is not being delivered in a coherent fashion. This is the case in every parish in Ireland, and I have heard from other Deputies that it goes up one road, bypasses another and comes down another with gaps left in the middle, in no man's land, for no particular reason. The technology is there to deliver it but the Department needs to put pressure on broadband providers to ensure they do not bring it into a road unless they can do the entire road or the entire area, rather than leaving it segregated as it is at the moment.

I look forward to working with the Department and the Chairman in this committee. We have a lot of work to do but we have the template with the Action Plan for Rural Development. I know that everybody in the Department is committed to it, as are the Ministers, Deputies Ring and Kyne. I lend my support to the plan.

Rural transport was also mentioned but we do not have rural transport at the moment. Last night I was in the Dáil canteen and was speaking to a political correspondent who told me they were getting the bus at 10 o'clock. I said I wished I could do that at home but we do not have these services. We have to create ways to incentivise communities to provide this missing transport link with a community taxi service, and we need to assist in this, not just on paper but with some sort of funding. The biggest obstacle seems to be insurance and the regulations around that. However, I compliment the work that has been done and welcome all the money that has been made available through the different schemes in the past year. I also welcome the additional local improvement scheme, LIS, money that came from the Minister, Deputy Ring, the other day, as it is vital and we need to continue to roll it out as it is showing tangible results in rural areas.