Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The first thing we must recognise is there are growing rural areas near the towns, but there are still rapidly-declining rural areas away from the towns. Rural policy in recent years seems to be focused more on large towns than it is on the more remote, more challenging rural areas. All one need do is talk to people in the GAA clubs and local schools to understand there is a danger, in some places, of the schools closing completely and that in other cases it is impossible to put a team together. We need to recognise the challenges and deal with them.

The first challenge we get is that planning policy is totally against the traditional rural settlement of rural Ireland. The establishment made up of academics and administrators seems hell-bent on making it practically impossible to build a house for one's family, especially in more scenic rural areas.

These are not one-off houses. I have never seen a one-off house. I have seen houses in dispersed rural villages but not a one-off rural house. They are all part of a community and are and were the backbone of many rural communities in Ireland. What seems to be happening is they are trying to impose planning policies from Europe where there is a different settlement history from Ireland. I applaud the willingness of the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, to listen on this issue and to take action accordingly. I am not hopeful at all that if they proceed with the rural housing guidelines as were proposed and as I heard them to be that we would be going forward. In fact, I think we would be going backwards. We need to start back at the rural planning framework, which is where the fundamental initial problem lies, and build on that and get proper rural housing guidelines. Unfortunately there is not enough time here to speak on the various issues. One issue I would like to mention is that 10% of rural houses are still dependent on wells or private sources of water. Those trying to connect to an Irish Water scheme are charged €300 per metre for a connection. It is absolutely scandalous. We need a scheme like the rural broadband scheme that would bring water to every house in the country and ensure that everybody has access to good quality public water.

The next issue I would like to talk about is roads. Some members of the Government seem to think that roads are unnecessary. We need to upgrade our roads to a minimum standard so they are safe for vehicles, cyclists and cars. One of the reasons people do not walk on rural roads is that they are totally inadequate.

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