As the Deputy might suspect, I do not have details on the HSE plans. This project will pass to it soon in terms of further questions. My officials and Galway County Council have worked continuously to progress the pier developments on Inis Oírr and Inis Meáin. I can confirm that progress has been made in recent months. In July last year, the Minister gave approval to issue a request for tender for the development of the Inis Oírr pier and Galway County Council is currently undertaking this process. The closing date…

I will do that. Regarding Inis Oírr, I understand the county council is working on the final business case, with a view to submitting it to my Department next month. On Inis Meáin, the current status of the feasibility study is that the closing date for the submission of tenders was 20 September. The responses are currently being assessed, with a view to appointing a consultant in the coming weeks.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 71, 75 and 76 together. Launched in 2022, the town centre first, TCF, policy is a major cross-government policy that aims to tackle vacancy, combat dereliction and breathe new life into our town centres. It supports the vision outlined in Our Rural Future for a thriving rural Ireland. It does this by providing a framework to facilitate and resource the regeneration of Irish towns to ensure they are vibrant and viable places to live, work, invest in and visit. Significant progress ha…

One of the best ways I can describe to the Deputy the potential of the town centre first policy is from what I have seen in my own area. Much of it is capital investment for sure, but the starting phase of much of it was actually consultation with the local community who knew their town best. That happened in Lusk. There was huge consultation and huge input. People are obviously very interested in improving the community and the village in which they live. It was an enormous consultation with lots of ideas put toge…

I do not have a list of all the incentives that are in the Department of housing, but there are incentives for that over-the-shop vacancy and other recent incentives. On the town centre first scheme, local knowledge and consultation with the community has to be the basis of it. My understanding of the allocation to Kilrush is that it is to feed into the development of a plan. Obviously, the plan is the starting point. There are other supports available to support the town team and the council to do this work. It do…

Our Living Islands: National Island Policy 2023-2033 was launched in June of last year on the Gaeltacht island of Árainn Mhór, County Donegal. Our Living Islands is a substantial document; a ten-year policy backed up by rolling three-year action plans. It has time-bound commitments so that Departments and agencies across Government can be held to account for its implementation. The policy serves the communities of all our populated offshore islands, both Gaeltacht and non-Gaeltacht. The Irish language is an essenti…

I am happy to take back the Deputy's request for an update on the expected publication date of the planning guidelines. There are specific housing incentive supports for the islands, including to address dereliction. My Department provides subsidies for additional transport costs involved for islanders. That was reviewed during the cost-of-living crisis and in some cases it was increased as well. Údarás na Gaeltachta has been identified as the lead key body or joint stakeholder for a number of actions. It is also r…

I fully agree with the Deputy. We must protect the islands and bring life back into them. They are a part of our national identity as well. I very much agree with his point on tourism, which is more developed on some islands than others. I was on the Aran Islands last summer, where tourism is very well developed. I was more recently on Cape Clear in Cork as well. We have made some very important tourism commitments. One of them is to assess the feasibility of developing new coastal walking trails and cycling routes…

Supports are available across my Department's broad range of funding programmes to build the capacity of groups to engage in application processes. The social inclusion and community activation programme is the Government's primary social inclusion intervention. The newest iteration features a dedicated core area of community animation, focusing on building capacity in community representative structures, establishing new community groups, and empowering communities to lead on identifying their own needs and sustai…

A couple of points occur to me. If I do not get to them all, I will do it in follow-up. There is a responsibility, if the Deputy is talking specifically about community centres, on the local authority which needs to engage with its local community. I know there is a good community department in Cork and I know a few of the people in there who would be committed. I also know the area of Ballyvolane and I am familiar with the situation the Deputy describes. This is one of the reasons we developed the community centre…

I am identifying an immediate need and a long-term need. Building projects take time. If there is a site and the council is engaged with it, we are on for talking to them. We now have the community centre investment fund. It is oversubscribed, but there is an option. There are other options with possible smaller allocations. One thing I will put out there when it comes to immediate need, and it is something I have worked on with the Minister for Education, is that we have a lot of schools beside Fair Hill, which th…

Yes, that comes up and we can engage with them on it. There are ways around it. A lot of schools open up and some do not, but there is an onus on schools. They are not just education facilities. They are key pieces of infrastructure in the wider community. There may be potential there. I do not know the specifics of the school.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 74 and 79 together. The local improvement scheme supports the improvement of rural roads and laneways that are not usually maintained by local authorities. As part of Our Rural Future, the Government is committed to ensuring the LIS is funded into the future. In April of this year, funding of more than €40 million for the 2024 and 2025 schemes was announced, which included additional once-off funding in respect of 2024. This announcement of scheme funding over two years was aimed to…

I thank the Deputies. There was a recent review of eligibility. The scheme eligibility criteria were amended for 2024. Eligible road projects are those that involve the improvement of non-public roads which provide access to two or more parcels of land that are owned or occupied by different persons, one of whom must be using it for agricultural purposes or harvesting. Evidence of agricultural activity can be proven by other means than a herd number; for example, farm payments or mart receipts can be used. The redu…

The Deputy will appreciate that I might not have the answers to all of the questions he has asked. As the LIS is not my dedicated function, I am not all over the detail. He asked about the level of drawdown by Cork County Council. My understanding is that the council fell short some years back but has improved its drawdown rate more recently. I will get some facts for the Deputy on that. While I will have to confirm whether local authorities are allowed to engage with contractors, my understanding is that this is p…

We will get back to the Deputy with some detail on that.

I have an issue in that I do not have a prepared response for Question No. 91.

The best I can do is to tell the Deputy that we will get back to him with some detail on that. I simply do not have the information available.

The expectation is that decisions will be made on the community centre investment fund by the end of the year. That is as much information as I have on it. I have nothing here to support that.

Given that it is World Mental Health Day, maybe we could take a 20-minute mental health break.