Ten Million Euro Investment in Rural Ireland is a Poor Start.

Sinn Fein TD for Wicklow East Carlow has said that government plans to invest ten million Euro into rural development is a poor start:

“The government has announced an investment programme of ten million Euro for rural Ireland. While all monies directed towards reinvigorating the rural economy is to be welcomed, this announcement suggests that the government really need to wake up to the realities of decline affecting rural towns and villages all over the country. Minister Heather Humphreys has accepted that this funding is not the ‘Silver Bullet’ needed to solve the challenges faced by rural Ireland. On this we agree – in fact, it is not even a wooden pellet never mind a silver bullet.”

Teachta Brady said that citizens deserve better than to be fobbed off by token gestures:

“Similar to the government’s paltry three euro increase to pensioners recently, this latest initiative is another example of delivering insults rather than results. Fine Gael and Fianna Fail together have proven to be a double whammy of ineffective and underfunded miscalculations. It is now an accepted reality that urban areas such as Dublin are disproportionately benefitting from our slow, unequal so-called recovery. Counties like Wicklow and Carlow are seeing little or no benefit, despite being on the capitals doorstep. This urban focus is exacerbating rural decline meaning small towns and villages in this constituency and across the country are left with boarded up businesses and a continued brain drain as younger people move away.”

“Sinn Fein have been calling for serious investment for years and have produced detailed costed plans covering everything from providing adequate medical and ambulance services, decent transport services, village and town investment plans to broadband and Infrastructure. If we are going to invest, let’s do it properly and in a way that will have a real impact. Ten million Euros might sound like a lot of money but when it is divided up between 200 villages and towns, it will barely cover the cost of cutting the grass on village greens.”