Ray Butler (Meath West, Fine Gael)

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for the opportunity to speak today on the preparation plans of local authorities for rural and urban road networks in severe weather conditions.

With the potential onset of severe weather conditions in the weeks and months ahead, I want to raise this matter today in light of a scheme I have become aware of in the UK that I believe could work well here in Ireland. In the UK, provision is made available to local borough councils for an amenity grant, which is allocated to farmers in rural areas to help with gritting rural road networks. Once successful in tendering for this grant, farmers then store banks of sand, grit and gravel on their land for use on the surrounding rural roads in the event of the onset of severe icy and snowy conditions. Payment is made to these farmers in the form of a nominal fee for their assistance in this scheme. These farmers have the responsibility for spreading the grit on all of the rural roads not covered by the borough council directly and in addition, local residents can also access these banks of grit for their own private laneways and surrounding areas, should it be required. This pooling of resources and co-operation among farmers and local residents has worked to the benefit of all in isolated rural areas, in particular, in Scotland where wintry conditions are more prevalent.

In our case, we have seen many hundreds of housing estates spring up during the Celtic Tiger years in rural areas, where planning permission was given by local authorities for these developments. Unfortunately, the vast majority of rural road networks surrounding these estates are not gritted by local authorities, which has resulted in residents being left stranded and unable to leave their homes. This was very evident last year in my constituency, in small townland areas such as Kilmessan which has an approximate population count of 1,000 residents, as well as Kildalkey and Ballivor, to name but a few. Residents in these areas could not leave their homes to attend work, school and college for almost a fortnight because the surrounding roads were not gritted. I make the point that if local authorities see fit to approve planning for housing in rural areas, they should include rural road networks for road gritting as a priority.

Based on the UK model, I urge all local authorities to consider provision of this scheme. I have spoken to farmers in my constituency who certainly impressed upon me that they would be more than willing to participate and provide areas of their land for storage of banks of grit. They also indicated their willingness to use their own machinery to disperse grit on the roads that are not included on the national gritting route. It is also important to note at this point that public transport services still must use these rural road networks and without gritting in place, serious accidents are likely to occur.

As winter progresses and in light of the serious wintry conditions forecast, I hope the UK scheme I outlined will be considered by the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. This scheme could provide a workable solution and sustainable support to residents living in rural Ireland who otherwise would be completely imprisoned in their homes in severe weather conditions.

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