Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Roads were always funded by the Department of Transport. In fairness to Deputy Michael Ring, when he became Minister in the Department, he started to fund them. No more than Deputy Kerrane, we are rural Deputies and know the benefits. He created a fund within the Department of Rural and Community Development.

The Department of Transport has a very large capital budget, far in excess of what my Department has. I am putting 10% of my budget into LIS schemes via the capital budget. I have raised the matter with the Minister, Deputy Ryan, on a number of occasions and have not made much progress yet. I am a firm believer that if you do not succeed, you try and try again. I will continue to keep after the Minister, Deputy Ryan, on this because that Department should match the funding. If it matched the fund I am putting in place, we would not be long getting rid of the list of LIS schemes. I spoke to representatives from Leitrim County Council the other day and it has cleared its backlog. I want to see how we can get rid of the backlog.

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