Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

That is not a problem. The Minister of State is very welcome. We are facing into a wonderfully big year in the life of W.B. Yeats, as next year will be the 150th anniversary of his birth. My motion asks the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport to ensure Fáilte Ireland would consider providing a licence to the Yeats Thoor Ballylee society, of which I am chair, to enable fund-raising to begin in order that Thoor Ballylee, the ancestral home of W.B. Yeats, can be opened in time for Yeats's 150th birthday in June 2015.

A year ago we set up this local committee and I was asked to chair it. It aims to celebrate the life of W.B. Yeats, specifically as it concerns Thoor Ballylee which is situated in south Galway, near Gort, Lady Gregory's Coole Park and the Kiltartan museum. That entire area is dedicated to the life of W.B. Yeats and the trials and tribulations of the man in south Galway. We set up this committee to reopen Thoor Ballylee because it was closed in 2009 after the flooding. It is now under the remit of Fáilte Ireland, which cannot afford to reopen or run it. However, it is on our committee and it is very committed to handing it over to a group such as Galway County Council in conjunction with ourselves, a community group. The newly named Yeats Thoor Ballylee society is made up of myself, Ronnie O'Gorman, who is the secretary, a number of local businessmen and real community activists, Fáilte Ireland, Galway County Council, and Galway Rural Development Company Limited. At our last meeting we had Senator Susan O'Keeffe visit, who is the national chair of Yeats's 150th birthday, so she knows what we are trying to achieve.

According to Fáilte Ireland, we need about €400,000 to reopen the monument. We have had it assessed by people in the know who would be tendering for this. They do not believe we need anything like that sum. I just toured it myself and it is in great shape. It needs cleaning and maintenance. However, we do not dispute that money is needed, not just to open it, but to run it. We have umpteen offers of money from America, the UK and Ireland, but we cannot accept them unless we have a licence to run it. We are asking the Minister of State for a licence for one year to enable us to fund-raise in order that we can get past the 150th anniversary, have Thoor Ballylee open, not just for Ireland but for the world, and join Sligo in the overall picture for Yeats. We are quite convinced that we will hand back Thoor Ballylee to Fáilte Ireland, Galway County Council or whoever and that we will work with them in a community-based, linked initiative to ensure this is run. We have an army of people ready to do this. We are totally committed and I am delighted the Minister of State is here to listen to this.