Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Rural Independent Group wants to see the Brexit talks concluded. We look forward to the Taoiseach's briefing on the text this evening.

Several weeks ago, I raised the issue of economic and social deprivation in County Tipperary, particularly areas of Tipperary town and west Tipperary, with the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Deputies Regina Doherty, and the Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, Deputy Humphreys. The former indicated that far from being areas of deep concern, County Tipperary and Tipperary town are flourishing and thriving. Nothing could be further from the truth. It appears that the sky-high rate of youth unemployment and the Pobal index figures on deprivation are figments of people's imagination. This assessment has created a deep sense of anger across the county. People have taken to the streets in their thousands to highlight the reality of the situation and to try to bring home to the Government what is actually taking place on the ground, or more accurately what is not taking place. There is a total lack of understanding and empathy.

I would like to refer to a comparative study that was commissioned and written by Ms Lisa English, who is involved in the Jobs for Tipp action group. The findings of this study, which compares deprivation levels in south Tipperary with those in the north-east inner city of Dublin, are truly disturbing. The report finds that the districts of Tipperary east, Tipperary town, Tipperary west, Clonmel west and Carrick-on-Suir all score more highly on the Pobal deprivation index than areas in Dublin's inner city. It concludes that deprivation levels in the towns of Tipperary, Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir are far in excess of those in inner-city Dublin. Unlike Dublin's inner city, there are no special tax incentives or developer-led initiatives to help to regenerate towns in County Tipperary.

The Jobs for Tipp action group has made applications over a number of years to the town and village renewal scheme but they were all refused, despite the fact it has a property from Tipperary Co-Op on a long-term lease. Added to the challenges is the fact that overall the south-east region is the second most disadvantaged in Ireland. Despite its importance to the region, the N24 also suffers from slow journey times and substandard design and alignment, and it is congested where it is routed through a number of towns, particularly Tipperary Town, Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir, as well as villages. It is choking Tipperary Town.

There is one option I want the Taoiseach to consider and it would demonstrate a real commitment on the part of the Government to the county. Under the Planning and Development Act 2000, consideration can be given to the creation of a strategic development zone, SDZ, in the south and west of County Tipperary to help tackle deprivation and to attract small-scale job creation in towns such as Tipperary Town and Carrick-on-Suir. Such zones have been used successfully in places such as Cherrywood and the docklands in Dublin. A Tipperary development company or task force could be established in co-operation with Tipperary County Council and central government funding. Will the Taoiseach support this option or, at the very least, ask the relevant Ministers to create an interdepartmental group to bring some joined-up thinking to this crisis? The message is just not getting through. There seem to be no genuine sense of the special circumstances that are preventing areas of Tipperary from tapping into the growth that is slowly starting to materialise in other parts of rural Ireland.

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