Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Thanks to my cousin, Ed O'Loughlin, I became aware over the weekend that progress has been made to repatriate the body of a County Kildare native, Patrick Sarsfield, who led the Jacobite army during the Siege of Limerick city in 1691. We have many Sarsfields teams and one of those, of course, is Newbridge in County Kildare. Patrick Sarsfield was buried just outside Liège in Belgium. The exact location of the burial ground has now been established following the intervention of Dr. Loïc Guyon, the honorary consul of France in Limerick. There is a Sarsfield homecoming project, which I think is great. Patrick Sarsfield was born and brought up where the National Stud is located in Tully in County Kildare, so we also wish to lay claim to him.

I also welcome the €25.6 million announced for roads in County Kildare this morning. There is €8 million for Athy southern distributor road, SDR, and it is fantastic to see the progress there. Equally, work will be done on eight bridges from Moone to Athy to Rathangan to Ballymore Eustace. Important funding was also provided for safety improvement works in places like Feighcullen, Fontstown, Rathmuck and Ballykelly.