Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the leader of our group, Deputy Mattie McGrath, for his work on this motion. I also thank Aisling in the Minister's office and Tríona, David and Máirín in Deputy McGrath's office for their work. This is a very important Private Members' motion.

Regional and local roads providing links between rural communities and towns and larger urban centres are vital. Members and councillors representing rural areas know at first hand, and better than most, the value of funding for roads. With regard to the lack of funding for roads in County Kerry and throughout rural Ireland over the years, local authorities are not to blame. They are starved of funding. Every one of us knows that.

I wish to highlight the conditions on roads in Kerry. Certain roads, particularly in north Kerry, could be described only as something one would see in Beirut. Funding is required urgently to bring these roads up to the standard in the rest of the country.

It would be very neglectful of me at this time if I did not compliment and thank Kerry County Council. I praise our county councillors, the management of our council, our senior and junior engineers and, most important, the people who work on our roads. The latter are the people I most admire. These are the people who at 12 midnight, 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. are out in lorries salting the roads if the night is frosty. They are the people who are out the morning after a flood trying to repair the damage done the night before, be it by cutting back trees or filling potholes. They drive JCBs to clear the roads and keep them open. It would be very neglectful of me not to thank those people. I can speak only for people working in County Kerry but I wanted to go on the record of the Dáil to say I appreciate every hour they give on our roads and the work they are doing. I appreciate also the people who came before them who are gone to their eternal reward. I praise from a height those I knew and the ones I know now.

County Kerry is choked from both sides. The problem arises coming through Adare on one side and through Macroom and Ballyvourney on the other. This is resulting in businesses not wanting to locate in our county even though it is the finest county not only in Ireland, but in the world. It is most unfortunate that access has been neglected over many years. Major projects need to go ahead and require continued funding urgently. I am glad there is now movement on the Macroom and Ballyvourney bypasses but we need sustained funding for a number of years to ensure we will have a bypass in Adare and direct access down from Cork city, which is of huge importance.

Let us consider some of the circumstances with which we are dealing and the dangerous junctions in County Kerry. I highlighted this previously in the Dáil and it was most unfortunate that some Deputies believed it was something to laugh at. There is nothing to laugh at. I make no apology to anybody for raising in the Dáil the need for more funding to deal with dangerous junctions in our county. If I must raise the requirement for lights to deal with the number of accidents at dangerous junctions, such as where the R569 meets the Cork-Killarney road, the N22, I will not be one bit ashamed of raising it in the Dáil. I was sent up here to represent people on both big and small issues. Any issue of people dying on our roads is paramount.

Another issue I want to raise is that of hedges overhanging and encroaching on roads in County Kerry. People talk to me about the protection of birds. It is the biggest load of nonsense because a bird has a brain too. I know of no birds that are foolish enough to want to put their nests on the edge of the road where a lorry will be whistling by. They will go into a field and into quiet areas where they can build their nests and hatch their eggs in peace away from the traffic. Any person who believes it is wrong to cut hedges at certain times of the year is only talking balderdash. It makes no difference in the world what week of the year one cuts a hedge if it is going to protect people's lives. In the past, councillors were able to use councillors' allocations to cut hedges. That practice should be allowed to continue. In many instances, there will be landowners who are not present. They might be away in America or have emigrated. Trying to have uniformity such that everybody with land along a road will cut hedges at the same time is not working.

Deputy Mattie McGrath rightly referred to damage to vehicles and I disagree with him on only one point, namely, the cost of a mirror. There are certain vehicles for which one would not get a smell of a mirror for €200; they cost a lot more. Some coaches and buses have heated mirrors that in many instances can cost up to €1,000. If the poor people running the buses broke a mirror every couple of weeks or so many times in a year, it would be a fair loss to them.

The Minister, Deputy Ross, referred to deaths on our roads earlier in the year. I acknowledge he is extremely concerned about this, as is every Member in this House. We do not want people to die on our roads. I know for a fact - I would not say this only I know it to be true - that roaming deer are contributing to deaths on our roads. There has been an explosion in the deer population. It is no exaggeration to say a 70% cull of deer is urgently required. I refer to wild deer coming onto the roads. They are definitely causing deaths because people are swerving off the roads and losing their lives. The deer vanish and afterwards people ask why the car left the road. It is very clear and evident to me. Many have had their cars destroyed. If this occurs, young people cannot claim off their insurance. The killing thing about it is that the OPW and such bodies say that if one is out shooting deer, it is their deer.

However, when the deer is on top of the car's bonnet and the person is wondering whether anyone will provide compensation, the answer is "No" because the deer is a wild animal. That the vehicle is broken and the person may have been injured is his or her own tough luck.

I will mention something that is close to my heart. Many years ago, I attended a famous meeting in a great place called Glencar, which is up from Beaufort in County Kerry, where we fought for funding for local improvement scheme, LIS, roads. When I started out on Kerry County Council, I was proud that it was doing anything up to 60 roads per year under the LIS.

We can discuss roads until tomorrow night, but the most important section of any road for anyone is the last stretch that he or she travels every day to get home. Let us take the Leas-Cheann Comhairle as an example. When he was far away in Europe, the one place that he had to travel was the last stretch to his house, wherever that might be. Regardless of whether that happens to be a mile, half a mile or a quarter of mile of a private road, and regardless of whether there is just one house or multiple houses on it, that road is of national importance to its residents. The people of Ballinskelligs are every bit as good as the people of Blackrock. Do not ever forget it.

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