“A potentially disastrous decision” with “serious implications in relation to employment” in the Aran Islands and Connemara is how changes to the Social Inclusion and LEADER programmes is being described.
Fianna Fáil agriculture spokesperson and Galway West TD Éamon Ó Cuív is calling on the Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly to “step back from the brink” and reconsider the move to treat Connemara and the islands as one area for the purpose of delivering the LEADER Programme and the new Social Inclusion Programme, SICAP.
Previously the Gaeltacht had been a separate entity in view of the region’s linguistic requirements. The non-Gaeltacht part of Connemara was also a separate company because of the different topography and population structure compared to east Galway and also because of the geographic isolation of Connemara from the west of County Galway.
When Dep Ó Cuív had been Gaeltacht Minister he introduced an arrangement where the Connemara Gaeltacht and the islands were treated as a unit and that there was a further company based in the west of the county, headquartered in Letterfrack to provide services for the remainder of Connemara; while Galway Rural Development providing the services for east Galway.
“This arrangement has worked well in the last seven years and popular opinion would indicate that people are happy with this arrangement,” he said. “There is a saying, don’t fix it if it isn’t broken, but this Government seem hell bent on breaking everything that is working.”
Dep Ó Cuív said there will be “very serious implications in relation to employment in both Inis Óirr and Letterfrack under the arrangement now proposed by the Government”.
