Budget for improving local roads slashed in 2025 – Pa Daly TD
28 March 2025
Sinn Féin spokesperson on Transport, Pa Daly TD, has questioned the accuracy of recent announcements by government-supporting TDs in Kerry and slammed the government for the significant decrease in funding available for improving local roads in 2025.
He called on them to remedy this urgently and to increase the funding for this essential rural scheme.
Commenting on a response to a parliamentary question posed to the Minister for Rural and Community Development, the Kerry TD said:
“Despite all their kite-flying over the past few months, the government have actually slashed the funding available to local authorities to improve local roads.
“The Minister tried to obscure this fact by combining the allocation for 2024 and 2025 in his reply to me. However, when the 2024 spend was taken into account, the amount left over for 2025 was considerably less than in recent years.
“The total funding available in the state for local improvement schemes reduced by nearly a quarter when compared to 2024, and by nearly a third when compared to 2023.
“While these figures are staggering, they are even more shocking when broken down by county.
“In my own constituency of Kerry, the funding available is over 55% less.
“Kerry County Council spent €174,7653 on improving roads in 2024.
“The combined allocation of €2,569,237 in 2024/2025 only leaves €821,584 for 2025.
“With over 600 roads on the list in Kerry, there is already a waiting list of nearly 30 years. Slashing resources is not the way to go.
“These numbers fly in the face of all the hot air and bluster regarding roads improvement over the last few months.
“Predictably, the government is saying one thing but doing another.
“I am calling on them to stop codding the people of Kerry, to rectify this situation and ensure this essential scheme for Kerry is properly resourced rather than slashing its funding.”
