Micheál Carrigy (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State, Deputy Ossian Smyth, is very welcome as was the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, who was here earlier. Back in 2018, I was down in Sligo when Project 2040, the national development plan, was launched. After a significant amount of pressure by local representatives in the midlands and up into the north west, the N4 project was put back onto the national development plan. It had reached the emerging preferred route stage in 2008 when the economic crash came and there it remained.

In his opening speech, the Minister said: "Delivering the NDP will have a transformative impact on employment opportunities, economic development and regional growth to support our growing population". The programme for Government also refers to balanced regional development. Unfortunately, those of us who live beyond Mullingar and in the north west are not serviced with that connectivity to our main city and our main ports because funding for that project did not happen for over a decade. We got it back onto the national development plan and now just €200,000 has been allocated by the Department for that project in 2023 to bring it to an emerging preferred route stage again and there it will stop.

Lands and households have been locked for the best part of 20 years on that route. A significant number of landowners on the route and the other emerging route have been locked for the last four years. Now we are only funding it to reach an emerging preferred route status which is not a definitive route. Those of us living in the midlands and the north west are not being treated fairly. Every other region in the country has that connectivity to our capital city so that they can avail of balanced regional development but we do not because we are the only area in the country that is not served.

The introduction outlines where projects were completed, including the N4 from Collooney to Castlebaldwin, which is the far side of a route where there is a single carriage way. There is a dual carriageway or motorway as far as Mullingar, followed by a single carriageway and then a dual carriageway in towards Sligo. Senator Dolan mentioned the €250 million spent on that project at the other side, but in between all the traffic on the N4 coming from the entire north west, including Mayo, Sligo, Leitrim, Roscommon, Donegal and part of Westmeath is travelling on this single carriageway route.

Journey times to get to our cities are longer, including for buses. We have a single train line. For long sections of 20 or 30 miles, there is only a single line and so there is not a regular train service. From 2008 to today, there have been 20 fatalities, 34 serious injuries and 218 other accidents on that route. There are approximately 130 exits off that section of road. If we want to provide balanced regional development, everybody in the country needs to benefit from the national development plan. I feel that we in Longford are not benefiting because we do not have many of these infrastructure projects.

St. Joseph's Hospital is crying out for extra funding. Upgrades have been done to the beds there. A minor injury clinic was opened linked to Mullingar General Hospital, which is our local general hospital, but that was located at a private hospital in Mullingar instead of investment going into another hospital in Longford where we have an X-ray department and other services. I do not think we are getting our fair share. This was a kick to the businesses, landowners and householders in our region who will be sitting in limbo again not being able to plan ahead or apply for planning permission. Significant investment is waiting for this route to be decided. Pat McDonagh of Supermac's made an application to develop a plaza on this route which would bring investment into our county. I want that message brought back to the Department. We are entitled to our fair share of funding from the national development plan. It is incumbent on all of us in counties in the north west to demand that.