Imelda Munster (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I wish to make a few comments in general on the plan. I accept it is in draft form but it is quite aspirational and very vague on detail in terms of targeted delivery and specifics. The plan will go out for public consultation, but we have seen once too often with county development plans that they are merely aspirational and they lie on a shelf gathering dust. I hope there is far more detail ultimately and that the plan will be backed up with funding. There was no reference to the plan in the budget in terms of costings or funding being set aside.

I will now examine the plan from a constituency perspective. Drogheda is the largest town in Ireland and there is no reference whatsoever to it in the plan. It is the largest town and it is the sixth largest urban centre in Ireland. In the foreword to the planning framework document, there is an emphasis on balanced development and growth and it states that development should take place at the right time and in the right places. One cannot ignore the fact that the largest town in Ireland with a population of more than 43,000 is lobbed in with smaller towns of 10,000 plus population in the draft plan.

Drogheda has all the attributes that no other town could claim. First, we are set right in the centre of the North-South corridor. We have access to motorway and rail transport. We are 20 minutes from the State's main airport and we have a thriving port, yet there is no reference to it whatsoever. If planning is to be strategic and to allow for future development, one cannot simply ignore the largest town and also an entire region and just stick with the five regions identified. That is not forward planning and it is not proper planning either.

Drogheda was left out of the spatial strategy and we were excluded from the living city initiatives. We were stripped of the borough council status. The current Government did that in its previous coalition with the Labour Party. Drogheda was also stripped of its town clerk and any resemblance of power, local democracy and accountability. The planning framework looks set to do likewise. I cannot emphasise enough how perfectly Drogheda is positioned within the north-east region and all the attributes it has to recommend its inclusion.

The current extended population of Drogheda is already larger than that of Waterford city.

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