Departmental Budgets
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-05
============================================================

Dara Calleary (FF), Mayo

I reiterate that we are backing that confidence. We are backing the confidence in rural communities and the confidence that is led by volunteers and are working with organisations, local authorities, development agencies and local development companies in terms of doing that. I can assure the Deputy the LEADER programme is fully funded and will deliver. We do have a challenge and I think I have been very straight in discussing it. We are working on the challenge regarding the next round of LEADER funding. As CAP negotiations are finalised this year, we are working hard. The Minister of State and I are working with colleagues to ensure CAP will be funded in the next EU funding programme. That presents a major challenge but it is one we are up for and are seeking to deliver on right across the country. All morning, we have discussed the community centres investment fund, CCIF, in Gaeltacht areas, in the community services programme and in the town and village renewal scheme. They are being driven by and in the interests of the rural communities and they are changing the future of rural communities. The forthcoming dedication of Our Rural Future will show our ambition as a Government working in partnership. The various independent analyses of our Our Rural Future that are to come will give a good sense of our ambition in that space.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-05/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:36+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-05