€115bn national plan for rural Ireland is ‘too Dublin-centric’

A €115bn Government plan to revitalise rural Ireland has come under fire for being too “Dublin-centric”.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar insists his Government is “putting its money where its mouth is” with the new National Planning Framework plan. He claimed it would result in a huge investment injection across our towns and villages, to cater for a rising population of a million people by 2040.

“What you see in the document is the draft National Planning Framework but what you haven’t seen yet is the €115bn investment plan, where the Government puts its money where its mouth is,” Mr Varadkar said.

The ambitious initiative was immediately criticised by several opponents, including Edgar Morgenroth, a professor of economics at DCU, and Louth IFA environment chair Breda Tuite, who labelled the draft “Dublin-centric and lacking ambition for rural Ireland”.

“There will be a million more people living in Ireland between now and 2040 and we need to plan now where they will live, work and study,” Mr Varadkar said. “If we don’t have a plan Dublin will continue to grow too fast, swallowing up other counties and cities.

“Other urban growth centres will continue to fall behind – they’ll grow but not as fast as Dublin and we will continue to see rural Ireland falling behind and see further depopulation in rural Ireland.”

While he claimed that 50pc of population growth would occur in towns and villages across rural areas, he told RTÉ Radio 1’s ‘This Week’ that 75pc of population growth was expected to take place outside Dublin, in cities including, Cork, Galway and Waterford.

The cities would “grow for the first time since the Vikings and twice as fast as Dublin,” he added.

“But to prove that you need to show that you’ll back it up with a major investment plan to bring on our cities and regions, including improved roads and broadband. “For the first time all roads do not lead to Dublin.

“We want to connect Limerick and Cork via the N20 to enable them to grow faster than Dublin in the 10 to 15 years ahead.

“One of the biggest single transport investments in Ireland was the Cork to Tuam motorway which cost €550m, bigger than the Luas Cross City investment,” he said. Rural TDs are critical of the NPF, warning that although the major initiative would be backed up by a €115bn 10-year investment fund, some communities would be sidestepped. Mr Morgenroth, who wrote a research paper for the ESRI on this issue, believes the scheme would only increase Dublin’s powerful economic position.

He also feels that depopulation would have occurred in rural Ireland, regardless of attempts to breathe new life into rural areas.

The NPF’s main provision is to redistribute economic growth out of the capital and across the country.

If the plan gets the go-ahead it would lead to increased populations in Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford by 50 to 60pc by 2040 while Dublin is expected to grow by up to 25pc.

‘If we don’t have a plan, Dublin will continue to grow too fast, swallowing up other counties and cities’