Frank Feighan (Sligo-Leitrim, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is a long-running saga. I recall 30 years ago coming to Leinster House to fight for the survival of the Dublin-Sligo train line. We are very proud of the line but I do not think it gets the attention it deserves. Something is happening in Sligo and the north west. I always say Sligo is the new Galway of the north west. The number of talented young people who have come to our area, whether to Sligo, Leitrim, Roscommon or Donegal, is incredible.

We now need a train service. We have a train service that leaves Sligo early in the morning at 5.40 a.m. but it takes more than three hours and ten minutes. If I want to get back to Sligo as well, the latest time is 7.15 p.m. and it gets into Sligo at 10.33 p.m. We need more services. I know it is not an issue of timetables. If I was to go from Ballyhaunis on the Castlebar-Ballina-Dublin line into Heuston Station, I would do the same distance in half an hour less. If I wanted to go from Galway to Dublin, which is 10 km longer, I would get to Dublin 40 minutes quicker than going from Sligo to Dublin. We want parity of esteem. Regarding our roads, we have the N4 and the N17, which get access into Sligo. We need much more attention to the Sligo line and therefore we need many more trains.

So much is happening in Sligo. There is the ATU, the new Atlantic Technology University, which has more than 25,000 students. Many people want to come to the north west. There is the new National Surf Centre in Strandhill. A businessman in another town told me they are finding it hard to get people to work there because people want to work four days a week - they want to go surfing in Strandhill on a Friday. That is what is happening and it is something.

We need now Irish Rail and the Government to, let us say, match up and put in more and perhaps quicker services. How will they do that? I know there is a problem from Maynooth into Connolly Station. However, we need to be a bit more adventurous and we need to look much quicker.

In Carrick-on-Shannon, there is the new Carrick Business Park, which was the MBNA facilities. Leitrim County Council bought it. Paddy Whiskey will be in the Lough Gill distillery. It will be the new Midleton or Bushmills of the north west. There is the Shed Distillery in Drumshanbo as well, which many people come to.

Something is happening in Sligo but we need more connections. We need more and quicker trains. We need the N4 and N17, which is not in the Minister of State’s brief today but we certainly need it looked at.

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