Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)

Our Rural Future is the whole-of-government policy for sustainable rural development. It seeks to ensure that all rural areas are attractive for people to live, work and raise their families in. One of the high-level outcomes set out in Our Rural Future is to increase the number of people living in rural areas. Rural population trends, as we discussed earlier, in line with many of the issues addressed by Our Rural Future, require input from across a range of Government Departments. This can be seen in the range of actions that have been delivered across Government in areas such as broadband and digital connectivity, transport, support for rural enterprises and support for the agrifood sector.

Within my own Department, I am committed to ensuring that schemes and supports in place retain a clear focus on supporting the vibrancy and sustainability of rural areas. In recent years we have seen unprecedented levels of financial support provided under schemes such as the rural and regional development fund, the town and village renewal scheme, the community centre investment fund, the LEADER programme and CLÁR. I will continue to ensure that these schemes are funded and targeted in the coming years to provide vital supports to rural areas and the young people who live there.

We are currently working on a new our rural future policy to run from 2026. We are undertaking a nationwide consultation. This strategy will also be informed by an independent OECD review of rural policy in Ireland, together with the consultation process, which will see us in Tullamore in June. There will also be a national youth assembly on rural policy in September. This will focus on young people in particular, the issues for young people and how to keep them and their families in rural areas. As I said, this has been a major focus in the consultations to date and will continue to shape the development of the new our rural future policy from 2026-30.

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