Written answers
Thursday, 1 May 2025
Department of Rural and Community Development
Departmental Schemes
Conor McGuinness (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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395. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the breakdown of local improvement scheme funding allocations, by local authority area, for each of the past five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [21892/25]
Conor McGuinness (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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396. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the current criteria used to assess applications under the local improvement scheme; and if he will outline any planned changes to eligibility requirements or prioritisation measures for 2025 and beyond. [21893/25]
Conor McGuinness (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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397. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the number of LIS projects completed annually since 2020; and if he will provide details of the average funding awarded per project. [21894/25]
Conor McGuinness (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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398. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the number of eligible local improvement scheme, LIS, applications that remain unfunded in each local authority area as of the latest available date; and if he will outline his plans to address this backlog. [21895/25]
Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 395 to 398, inclusive, together.
The Local Improvement Scheme (LIS) supports improving rural roads and laneways that are not usually maintained by local authorities. Since its establishment in 2017, the government has provided almost €170 million to local authorities for LIS.
While the Department provides funding for LIS, the scheme is administered by local authorities who are responsible for selecting and prioritising roads. Applications are received directly by local authorities, who engage with scheme beneficiaries on eligibility. Local authorities retain information on eligible roads that have yet to be repaired under the Scheme. Full details of the scheme can be found on the Department’s website.
Under the terms of the Scheme for 2025, eligible road projects are those that involve the construction or improvement of non-public roads which provide access:
- to parcels of land, of which, two or more are owned or occupied by different persons, one of which must be for agricultural purposes;
- for harvesting purposes (including turf or seaweed) for two or more persons; or
- to at least one parcel of land owned or occupied by a person engaged in agricultural activities and which separately provides access for harvesting purposes (including turf or seaweed) for at least one other person.
As has been the case in recent years, I will continue to monitor capital expenditure across my Department as the year progresses, to assess the potential to utilise any savings that may arise elsewhere for schemes such as the LIS. I have also engaged with my colleague, the Minister for Transport, in relation to potential cofunding of the scheme and will be engaging in the upcoming review of the National Development Plan with a view to increasing the capital allocations for schemes such as LIS.
As part of the annual drawdown process, local authorities are asked to provide an estimate of the number of outstanding roads awaiting improvement. Based on estimates provided by local authorities at the end 2024, it is estimated that approximately 4,000 potential road projects were on hands. However, the approach to these estimations vary across local authorities and it is not the case that all such applications have been assessed as eligible projects in individual local authorities.
The tabular statement at the following link provides details of the funding amount allocated to each local authority for the years 2020 – 2025, with a table outlining the number of roads completed per county from 2020 to 2025.
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