Planning Framework will squeeze the life out of rural Ireland

A former Minister has warned the current Government that its new national 20-year blueprint for development is nothing more than a “leprechaun policy” that could end up burying rural Ireland.

Ireland 2040 sets out a plan for how the country will grow over in the next two decades – but it has been described as a ‘ticking timebomb’ for rural Ireland that could, for example, wipe out GAA clubs like former All-Ireland champions St Thomas’ in South Galway.

The blueprint was discussed at Cabinet this week and is due to be published alongside the Government’s ten-year capital development programme.

However, Éamon Ó Cuív, the former Minister who held responsibility for rural areas, fears the National Planning Framework could strangle the countryside with overregulation.

It will have implications for one-off housing, said the Galway West Fianna Fáil TD, which will have knock-on negative implications for urban areas, including Galway city.

“It is a ticking timebomb,” said Deputy Ó Cuív.

“The proposed National Planning Framework, which in draft form, if implemented will do a huge disservice to this country because it will denude rural areas because it won’t give them investment and it won’t give them powers to develop in terms of planning.

“There are a whole lot of rules that will significantly diminish the right of rural people to live in rural Ireland, and the whole plan is towards urban areas. That also creates difficulties in urban areas, as I representing an urban area know,” he said.

Deputy Ó Cuív warned that if the plan was implemented over 20 years ago, St Thomas’ hurling club would not have won an All-Ireland senior hurling club championship. That’s because settlements like Peterswell, Kilchreest and Castledaly would be greatly restricted by the framework plan, which attempts to force people into living in cities, towns and villages, rather than smaller settlements.

“This plan, in terms of the obtuse language used therein, introduces many further restrictions on rural living, including in parishes like St. Thomas’ in South Galway that have produced fantastic hurling teams, and the many other areas that are totally dispersed. There is nothing wrong with these areas.

“They have huge capacity for growth because the schools can take more pupils and people provide their own infrastructure and as such they do not need huge State investment.” he said.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.