Office of Public Works Priorities and Progress: Statements
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-19
============================================================

PJ Murphy (FG), Agricultural Panel

I thank the Minister for coming to the House to discuss matters related to the OPW. In the few minutes I have, I want to discuss three items of interest to my own area of south Galway. I would first like to speak about an issue raised by Senator Rabbitte, the south Galway-Gort lowlands flood relief scheme. As the Minister of State will know, the south Galway-Gort lowlands area is a low-lying karst landscape. There is no direct river running to the sea from a huge geographical area in south Galway.
In the event of a predicted high-rainfall incident such as a one-in-100-year flood event, 50 homes will flood, 175 homes and 46 businesses will be cut off for prolonged periods, 19 rural communities will be isolated, the M18 from Galway to Limerick will close, the Limerick–Galway rail line will close and Crowe Street in Gort will be under water for a prolonged period. This has been seen a number of times during my lifetime and there is a lot of anxiety in the area about it. It is of great importance to the area to get the project moving as a matter of urgency.
The second thing I would like to raise with the Minister of State is the Kilmacduagh monastic site, which is an historic site under the control of the OPW just outside Gort, between Gort and Kinvara. The round tower at Kilmacduagh is Ireland's tallest. It is in impeccable condition, as is the whole site. It was built by St. Colman in the eighth century and remains one of our finest examples of a monastic settlement from that period. However, over the last ten years or more local people have noticed an increased lean in the tower. It has had a slight lean for over two centuries but over the last ten years this has been noticed to have increased. It has been monitored mechanically over the past three years and, over that period, the rate of increase in the lean has worryingly accelerated.
The site is an OPW site. It is one of our finest examples of a round tower in the country. If it were to collapse, it would be a national tragedy. Therefore, I ask the Minister of State to intervene with the OPW and ask for the necessary stabilisation works to be carried out on the tower as a matter of urgency. If it collapses and we are left with a pile of stones, it will be too late and a tragedy that cannot be undone will have taken place.
The third thing I would like to mention is a property not yet under the control of the OPW, namely, Dunguaire Castle, Kinvara, on the Wild Atlantic Way. Dunguaire Castle was previously under the ownership and management of the Shannon Group, along with the castle in Limerick city and Bunratty Castle. When the Shannon Group removed itself from the tourism infrastructure sector, it handed over Bunratty and the castle in Limerick to the relevant local authorities. However, over the last two and a half years, Galway County Council has procrastinated and has not yet taken ownership of the castle. During that time, the main tourist attraction in the town of Kinvara - the most photographed castle in Ireland - has remained closed to the public. Hundreds of tourists pass by every day. I urge the Minister of State to intervene and consider the potential for the OPW to take ownership of this property. As Galway County Council continues to procrastinate, the castle remains closed.

---

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/seanad/2026-05-19/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:57+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-19