Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That was a great example of a cliché-laden speech with no substance. The way the Department of Rural and Community Development is being set up is abysmal. We need a lot more detail from the Minister as to what is intended. Let us strip away all the fine talk and all the ráiméis in the Minister's speech that says nothing and is just a collection of wild statements with no substance and find out what he is doing. We are being asked to approve the setting up of a Department the functions of which we do not know. We are being asked to buy a pig in a poke.

Let us look at the obvious. If we only transfer over the functions of regional and rural affairs that are in the Department of Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs at the moment, a budget of €79 million transfers over with that. If we transfer over the community affairs section of the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, a budget of €80 million goes with that. That would give the Department about €160 million. If we look at the gross Estimates, even the Department of the Taoiseach, which is not a conventional Department because it is an administrative Department, does not have line functions and, therefore, does not have a significant budget, would have a bigger budget than this new Department. The Department of Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs has a budget of €368 million, making it by far the smallest Department, given the other Departments are spending very large sums of money. The Minister has not told us what this Department is going to do or if it is only going to continue on those functions. If that is all the Minister is getting, to be quite honest, it is more about show than substance. It is more about gaisce than really doing anything for rural Ireland.

It seems to me the Government is trying to get this through before the summer because it wants to avoid the debate about what should be the powers of the Minister for Rural and Community Development. Let us look at what was previously within the former Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs that is not going into the new Department. Responsibility for the North-South bodies, which include Waterways Ireland, which is predominantly a rural agency North and South, was in the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. Responsibility for the rural social scheme was in that Department.

Responsibility for the Gaeltacht, all of which is rural - was in the then Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. Responsibility for the islands - and there are no urban islands with a population on them - was in the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. It had a budget of around €380 million at the time. It also had other functions and I believed there were other aspects that should have been in that Department.

It seems to me that the Minister is losing the battle. He is losing the battle because the Departments defend the citadel against any change in any transfer of function. The Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, had some big ideas but he was quickly brought to heel. Is the Minister, Deputy Ring getting responsibility for the rural social scheme, for example? Is he getting the Tús scheme, which was set up subsequently by me when I was the Minister for Social Protection? Will the Minister get responsibility for farm assist, which by its very definition is a purely rural function? Will the Minister get responsibility for rural transport? Will he be given responsibility for decentralisation? We had the farcical situation at the coiste na Gaeilge last night of the Office for Public Works outlining the absolutely fantastic rents it pays here in Dublin when there are empty sites down the country for which plenty of civil servants, particularly the middle and lower ranks, are only bursting their guts and who could then be promoted into the senior positions in those rural locations. Is the headquarters of the Minister's Department to be here in the city or will it be in some rural location? In short, what is this Department about?

I read the Minister's speech and there is nothing really to read in it. It is all nice words such as "ensures that efforts". The Minister and I know - I would not like to embarrass him too much today - that he was supposed to be the Minister of State for rural development. He had all these functions already. He and I know that the famous rural action plan is the greatest piece of codology that was ever written around this place. They went around every Department and listed out everything they were doing that had any connection with rural Ireland - we know they have the odd health centre, school, road and sewerage and water scheme and all those other things in rural Ireland - and they put it all into the plan. Everything that every Department was doing with a rural aspect was put in this plan, but nothing else was. I am forgetting that there was something else; there was the famous promise that is not provided for in the budget, for €20 million for some vague scheme towards the back end of this year. That was what the whole plan was about. There are pages and pages of it and that is all we get out of the plan.

Between now and the end of this debate - I believe the debate will go on for a long time, a lot longer than he had anticipated - the Minister, Deputy Ring, had better start spelling it out. More importantly the Minister with the purse strings who brought in the Bill did not even bother turning up today. Even though it is his Bill, the guy who ultimately decides, in reality, who gets what out of the State's kitty, is not even here. I think this tells us everything.

Every day, every week and every month material is sent to Members about spatial strategy. It is clear that the Government, of which the Minister is a part, intends to publish a spatial strategy that would put all of the money into a small number of urban areas. It is quite a ridiculous approach, despite anything that any of these so-called experts tell us. The experts, however, do not often have to live with their folly. The experts tell us to push people into the cities because we need international competitive cities. We need an internationally competitive country, not internationally competitive cities. If the country is competitive then the cities will be competitive too. The Minister, Deputy Ring is telling me that in Galway we need a whole lot more people, when we cannot get housing for the people who are already there. We cannot accommodate them and we have no way of accommodating them over the next five years with this Government's plans. We are not building any houses either private or public. The Minister is telling people to go to Galway but there is no road in or out of the city and it has some of worst traffic jams in the State. Has the Minister, Deputy Ring, ever tried to get into the city coming from Westport any time between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m.? Has the Minister ever tried, without using the ministerially-privileged bus lanes, to get out of the city any time from 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.? Yet he wants to push a whole lot more people in to that city and leave the small schools all over rural Ireland such as those in Achill and Newport? He knew there was a population issue. The health centres are underutilised and the sports clubs are looking for players. What a waste of resources.

Has the Minister ever thought of the human outcome? We are always told that cities are successful. Parts of cities are successful. I can name some very successful companies and people in this town but we must remember the masses of people who are forced to live in the most deprived communities in our land. We must remember those people whose chance of getting a third level education is about 20% and those who live in communities rife with drugs. Does the Minister want to put more people into those communities? Does he want more people to suffer?

We need to know what the Minister's plan is with regard to the Government's spatial strategy. The Minister will wind up with a few little pretty schemes and the big boys and girls will go off to play. They will make the big decisions with the Minister who could not face us in the Chamber today and who did not want to be challenged about the big plans for investment in the State. These plans will put all of the money - as the Minister, Deputy Ring, and I both know - in towards the cities and yet the Minister wants us to sign off on this Bill and say that he is a great guy because he got a titular Department with no money, no functions, no power and no input. He will have no influence in the big decisions. The Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, however, will be able to boast that he set up the dedicated Department of rural affairs. To be honest, there was a Department with that function. I saw a press release saying this was the first Department of rural affairs. I had to laugh. I also saw in the newspapers recently a piece that seemed to say that the Minister, Deputy Ring, had set up the CLÁR programme. I have heard of the rewriting of history-----

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