Strategic Infrastructure
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-07
============================================================

Louis O'Hara (SF), Galway East

I am going back to the Minister of State, Deputy Moran. This is in relation to the castle. It is a key and world-class attraction on the Wild Atlantic Way. This castle has been closed for the past three years, as I mentioned, and is a huge loss to the local community. I know the OPW has a lot of other similar sites in County Galway, of which Athenry Castle and Portumna Castle are two that come to mind, and the OPW does a good job of running those sites. They are fantastic attractions, and I have a lot of confidence and faith in the OPW's ability to make a success out of Dunguaire Castle as well. Local people would welcome the OPW being involved in that particular castle. I urge the Minister of State to do everything he can to progress it. It is an awful shame to see the castle closed. We need to see the remedial works being done to bring it to a safe standard and, ultimately, reopened to the public. I welcome anything the Department or the OPW can do to progress that.

---

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/2026-07-07/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:07+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-07