Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I raise a financial issue. As the Taoiseach will know, on 1 May, Carlow became a university town and county and the south east got a technological university, but that brings many challenges. Carlow County Council has applied for €12 million in funding for a project to extend the library in Carlow because we need the services. The library is too small and is inadequate for the expanding services now that university status has been awarded. We have received stage 2 approval and we have proceeded to stage 3. Carlow County Council has a “cultural quarter” in the town centre, which includes Carlow College which is to be integrated into the technological university, and the expansion of the library with this new project. The capital funding for the library for this year is gone, as I understand it, but a new strategy for capital library projects is going to be announced by the end of the year. For regional development and finance for Carlow and because we are doing so well, I ask the Taoiseach to look at this favourably.

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