Rural areas, rural problems

Lisa Chambers

Fianna Fáil | Mayo

Elected: 2016

Broadband: The lack of broadband is a massive impediment to investment, job creation and attracting people to live in rural communities. This is no longer a luxury, but an absolute necessity to your daily living. We can no longer sit back and have these five- or 10-year plans for putting broadband in – it has to be an immediate action and a priority for the next government.

Minister for rural affairs: A minister for rural affairs is a necessity to address the widening gap between rural and urban, and to address the huge issues people are facing in rural communities in terms of connectivity, job creation and investment. We need a senior Cabinet position for someone to deal with those issues [and they must have] direct access to other ministries.

Depopulation: Yes we have had massive emigration out of Ireland but there has been huge migration west to east. You have the west of the country that struggles to keep schools open because we haven’t got population. We are struggling to get investment in the west because we need to have a population base to sustain that investment.

Job creation: The Government can’t force companies to locate in the west but they can create a favourable environment. That is where this Government has failed over the past five years. We need to identify areas where job creation is very low and we are committed to retaining people in those communities and providing long-term, sustainable employment.

Martin Heydon

Fine Gael | Kildare South

Elected: 2011

Broadband: It is without a doubt the biggest issue in rural south Kildare. In the last capital plan for the next five years, we set aside €264m to be ploughed into the rural broadband scheme and this will see us deliver 30MB high-speed rural broadband to every house in the country by 2020 and 85% of houses in the country by 2018.

Minister for rural affairs: I definitely think it is a good idea, my only concern about it is a minister with rural affairs will cross over with other departments. There is no point in having a minister for rural affairs unless they have power and real decision-making capability.

Depopulation: This comes down to jobs and it’s all about having jobs down in the regions. That will keep people in the regional areas and will have a knock-on impact on the GAA clubs and on the local rural communities where people stay at home and have their families. We have local authorities that want to stop one-off housing in rural areas. People’s right to live in rural areas is intrinsically important.

Job creation: There are steps the Government can take, that we have been taking in the past, to drive regional development of jobs. Action plans for jobs, which have been a success, have now been rolled out to the regions and have some very specific key measures that can be done at local level that will hopefully support small and medium-sized businesses. A lot of this is down to supporting our own local small indigenous businesses.

Willie Penrose

Labour | Longford-Westmeath

Elected: 2007

Broadband: If rural Ireland is to survive, broadband is one of the biggest issues. It is a necessity for young people in schools, for industry and for the agricultural community. We can mend all problems in rural Ireland but if the required level of broadband is absent we will still face major difficulties.

Minister for rural affairs: There has to be [a minister for rural affairs]. It is no use setting up talking shops and forums, what you need to do is set up a department and give it a budget. You can establish a department but you can strangle it at birth by denying it the resources necessary.

Depopulation: There is a dislodging and removal of population from the rural areas. When you have that displacement of population, that impacts on rural areas in terms of the teams, in terms of the school-going population, bringing communities together. Young people will leave. If they move to a city, they are more likely to stay there.

Job creation: Employment is a huge issue in rural areas, and that is an issue that has to be addressed. For startup business, we have to look at the possibility of giving people tax exemptions for a year or two or maybe that an investment can be recouped. Also, increase level of grants to ensure it makes it attractive for people to locate in those areas.

Denis Naughten

Independent | Roscommon-Galway

Elected: 1997

Broadband: I know the Government is proceeding with the tendering process now for a new broadband scheme. The difficulty with that is it is 2021 before that is in place. What can we do in the short term? There are four State-owned fibre networks and I think if we went to some of the broadband and wireless companies and said to them: ‘We will give you access to this network if you extend 4G network to a far broader area in the short term to deal with the immediate deficit.’

Minister for rural affairs: Having a distinctive voice at Cabinet that can argue in favour of rural Ireland is important but it is also important that the minister would have direct access to money and would have a direct say in how that money is spent.

Depopulation: One of the things that have been discussed during the talks is the possibility of some sort of a rural resettlement scheme. In relation to main streets in many of our local towns, we are looking for some sort of an incentive scheme to be put in place to see some of these commercial premises being turned into residential homes, which would bring people back into the towns and villages.

Job creation: One of the targets that we set out in the Fine Gael paper is that the unemployment rate in every single county in Ireland would be no less than 1% higher than the overall rate of unemployment in the country. That is going to require a lot of work.

Michael Healy Rae

Independent | Kerry

Elected: 2011

Broadband: It is absolutely necessary, whether it’s young people needing it for education purposes, or for work purposes, for research. Broadband is as essential as the water pipe running into your house and the sewer pipe running out of it.

Minister for rural affairs: I wanted just to make sure that the bus wouldn’t leave unless there was a minister for rural affairs on it. The Taoiseach assured me, as did Micheál Martin assure me, and I was very grateful for it, that if he were taoiseach, that there will be a minister for rural affairs. What the job would involve is rural-proofing all decisions and all legislation by Government, whether that be environment, health, all the different issues – it would all come back to the minister for rural affairs.

Depopulation: For the first time ever, my own parish are finding it difficult to put together a football team. Kilgarvan have no football this year for the first time ever.

Job creation: Take away a lot of the red tape; there are an awful lot of people in Ireland that could create a job for a terribly important person: themselves. If they created a job for themselves, then they could go and could create a job for a family member or a relative. That was the backbone of rural Ireland: getting jobs for themselves and making their own work.

Martin Ferris

Sinn Féin | Kerry

Elected: 2002

Broadband: There are places, especially in the more deprived areas, where they have no access to broadband. And areas that do have access, it is outdated. We would try and ensure that all Irish wholesalers and businesses in particular would have access to broadband, with 100MB at least.

Minister for rural affairs: It is not just political shenanigans, but it is an absolute necessity. Every department should rural-proof every bit of legislation they are enacting. And also to ensure that there is a balance. We’re trying to protect rural Ireland and ensure its survival, and we have to look at everything in that regard and encourage people to stay in it. It is a national right for people to stay in their local area.

Depopulation: We need to ensure that the IDA and Enterprise Ireland develop our economy in a balanced way and not just centred on the major cities.

Job creation: An awful lot can be done in rural Ireland with imagination. It needs financial support in order to do that. You must encourage companies to come in and invest in rural Ireland and this can happen if the political will is there to do it.