Aisling Dolan (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It just shows that there is a team of people here in the west fighting for funding for the population of the west. We are the seventh largest population with 180,000 people living in County Galway. We are the second largest county and that means a hell of a lot of roads in Galway.

As a Galway county councillor elected in 2019, I am fully aware of the devastating impact in terms of the roll-out of services to people and families who live in our towns and villages. This is our rural future. These are the policies we want to roll out at a local level. We cannot do it because in my own municipal district of Ballinasloe, which goes from Ballymote, close to Castlereagh in Roscommon all the way down to Banagher Bridge, in one section we have more than three vacant positions out of nine for general operatives. We are down an engineer. Another technician was promised last year but is still not in place.

We need clear guidelines on core funding as Senator Kyne as mentioned. We need to know as it impacts from housing and active travel to fire services and libraries on our ability to provide services in the county for enterprise, our planners, water services, economic development, our tourism and heritage officers who are trying to promote hidden heartlands and trying to bring more income into our area that is already suffering in terms of not being able to access these services that we should be seeing from local authorities.

Senator Kyne and I have been working closely with the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke. The Minister of State, Deputy Madigan, will be fully aware that we have raised this a number of times previously. Our budget is crucial. As Senator Kyne mentioned it is €802 per capita. To break that down, looking at each section within a local authority, for example, in housing the national average is €480 per person. In County Galway, €95 per person is allocated. It is beyond time that we state that Galway County Council needs support now. It needs exceptional support. I look forward to the response from the Department.