Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I, too, want to speak about the budget. I was very disappointed that post offices were not mentioned. We have 1,100 post offices in Ireland but there is fear of 400 being closed. A programme should have been put in place to keep extra services, whether through motor tax or tourism. We are promoting hubs through housing. Why not promote our rural post offices as tourist information centres where tourists can go to get information? That issue was neglected in the budget yesterday and that needs to be addressed.

There were great announcements in the budget about Leader. We are all involved in Leader. The Leader programme plays a major part in my local area but that programme started in 2014. It is now 2017 and not a penny for Leader has come from Government. Applications have been submitted for about 20 projects. Ten have been approved and not a penny has come in to our local authority. I know for a fact that other local authorities have not seen a penny either.

I say "Well done" to the Taoiseach on the new Department of Rural and Community Development. That is a good initiative but the Minister must do the job he is supposed to do and put the funding into local authorities. In my local authority, we were told that €624,830 was approved and would be given, with the possibility of approximately €1 million by the end of the year, but this has been going on for three years and we will be lucky to see the funding in 2018. It is important that in terms of new announcements in budgets, what has been already announced needs to be delivered to local authorities such as mine.

The Leader might ask the Department that some sort of programme be put in place to save rural post offices thereby ensuring that the 400 post offices under threat will not close.