Garret Ahearn (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Minister for Rural and Community Development, Deputy Humphreys, is in Waterford this morning to announce rural regeneration development funding in Waterford and other places across the country. I almost feel like I need to apologise to my colleagues because, possibly unknown to the Minister, she has pretty much given all the money to Tipperary. We have received funding this morning of more than €30 million to go into three projects. We got all three projects for which we applied. There is €4.5 million going to Roscrea, €12 million to my home town of Cahir and €14.5 million to Carrick-on-Suir. A significant amount of work has been done by the council and its staff, as well as my colleagues, including former Deputy Noel Coonan and Peggy Ryan in Roscrea. I was working on the application for Cahir while my colleague, Mark Fitzgerald, worked on the application for Carrick-on-Suir.

I wish to touch on the project in Carrick-on-Suir in particular because it was a very difficult one to get over the line. Mark did a significant amount of work while he was mayor. He got the application completed and agreed to at a council meeting. There had to be two or three votes, with votes having to be done in person during Covid. Members of the opposition on the council, one of whom is now in the position of mayor, were against it. They voted against it, did not want it and seemed to want the money to go to someone else. If it was not for Mark's leadership, the project would not have got over the line, as the Leader well knows. He played a key role in making sure that application was there to be picked and the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, delivered on that commitment that Carrick-on-Suir would be looked after. People in the town believe they sometimes get forgotten about because they are at the bottom edge of the county but this is the highest amount of funding any town in Tipperary has received since Fine Gael has been in government. Carrick-on-Suir is getting €14.5 million and I want to put on record the work and commitment Mark Fitzgerald put in as mayor to make sure Carrick-on-Suir gets looked after.