Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I acknowledge the work of the retail consultation forum which the Minister of State chairs. It is very positive that he is taking on board the recommendations made in the report published in March on the retail sector and the areas identified in the report. Small towns need to be the drivers of growth and recovery. As well as doing all we can to encourage job creation and job retention in existing businesses, we must encourage people back onto the main street of town centres. We must incentivise the development of derelict and vacant sites for commercial and residential use. We must get people back living on main streets. In the 1960s there were towns in the Minister of State’s county and elsewhere where 150 people were living but today there might only be ten. People have moved out and there is now dereliction or high vacancy rates in town centres. We must examine every measure we can to incentivise the development of town centres. We must also stop penalising development. For example, local authorities impose development contributions on developments on main streets. I accept that they must fund themselves, but we must incentivise development on main streets. We must consider living over shops, a subject in which my colleague, Deputy Michelle Mulherin, has a particular interest, to rejuvenate such areas. We must get people back into town centres and encourage business. In areas where commercial businesses have moved out we must allow for changes from commercial use to residential use where this is sustainable in town centre areas. We must encourage the provision of a mix of housing, not just social housing, within towns.

Property rights are protected in the Constitution, rightly so, but we must incentivise development. If people refuse to make town centre properties available for housing or other use, the introduction of a stick approach should be considered. If we continue to allow rural towns to die, the regional imbalance that is evident which has progressed in recent years will continue. I encourage the continuation of policies to get people back into town centres and allow businesses to grow. The more footfall there is and the more people there are living in them the better, including people from new communities who are more used to rental accommodation and city and town centre living. We must encourage such an approach.

See this speech in context