Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail)

Let us hope we will both be smiling when I get his response today.

The issue I am raising is a really important one for older people. I know that the Minister of State is passionate about supporting older people in their communities and helping them survive and thrive in their communities. The area that I am talking about is Kilcullen in County Kildare, a beautiful town known to many of us. It has a population of almost 4,000 people and an incredible community spirit that has been there for many decades and many generations. Because of that community spirit, we see excellent sports facilities and a wonderful town hall, along with a thriving Kilcullen community action group and Tidy Towns group.

One of the key initiatives that the people of Kilcullen decided they wanted to have was a daycare centre. Although it is a town that certainly has a substantial population of older people, it does not have a daycare centre. At this point, well over 20 people travel every day to Newbridge, which runs an excellent programme. The whole point, however, is that we need to have people in their own community where they could easily access daycare, meals on wheels services and so on. In 2015, a group of local people got together to develop an old disused dispensary on the edge of the town. At several stages I had the opportunity to see what was going on, to go inside and to support the fundraising efforts. The six people who started this were Albert Keenan, Steve Kinneavy, Jacinta Sully, Antoinette Buckley, Noel Clare and Liz Moloney and they have done amazing work since 2015. Of course, we had Covid in between. They were able to access money from grants and from fundraising. To date, €164,407 has been spent on the building, 71% of which came from grants and was, effectively, taxpayers' money. I know for a fact that the aforementioned people and the wider community relied on local people to give goods free of charge or at a reduced cost, so the actual cost would have been far more if they were paying market prices. It could have been up to €250,000.

The building was renovated and extended by volunteer labour and public grants to become a hub of social activity and day services for senior citizens. I believe that such buildings should have other components within them, and it was agreed that it could be used as a community centre in the evening. These great volunteers, who were driven by a desire to support older residents, support social inclusion and repurpose a derelict building, have done incredible work. This is about more than bricks and mortar. It is about building a future where older people can thrive.

There was an agreement that Kildare County Council would acquire the building from the HSE and help with the running of it, but the HSE made a decision to put it on the open market. After all of those years of volunteers fundraising, getting access to public money and having the lease for ten years, which they needed to acquire the money, they were told that it was being put on the open market. It is a disgrace and I hope the Minister of State has good news for us.