Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State referenced the rural regeneration and development fund. With regard to areas in which there may be job losses, can that fund be used to offset those losses to ensure that they do not occur or to avoid them?

We must try to limit the damage because Brexit is going to cause headaches for everybody. It is about limiting that damage. Recent independent reports from the Institute of International and European Affairs and the Department confirm that Brexit presents a doomsday scenario for Irish agriculture and the related food sector. It is having a huge impact on rural Ireland.

Industries are going to be under pressure, which the Minister and the Minister of State will accept, but new industries are emerging and one of the saviours for rural Ireland, including the counties the Minister, the Minister of State and I come from, will be renewable energy. Can a stream of funding from the Department be used for that to try to kick-start those new industries? There is a limited pot in the climate change fund but the Minister has a substantial pocket of money there. Is it open to us to use some of that funding to generate those new industries, particularly in areas with poor land that have been badly hit?

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