Rose Conway-Walsh on Ireland West Airport SDZ Roadmap

Minister, I welcome in the programme for government to develop a strategic development zones and I want to ask what this will look like for Ireland West Airport, NOC and what timescales will be on that. You know there is huge potential there, there is a huge untapped potential. We have 95,000 square metres that can be used for commercial enterprise space, for economic development in the region. It is really important that we know, I welcome the appointment of a manager specifically for this but I need to know what it looks like and I need to know will you drive it and will you make it a priority. Ireland. I want to thank Deputy Conway Welch for raising this really important matter and I look forward to working with her in delivering Ireland West Airport NOC's strategic development zone. Balanced regional development is a key focus of this government. My department contributes to this objective to the work of its enterprise development agencies, Enterprise Ireland and the IDA as well as through the network of 31 local enterprise offices which have the presence in every county. It is also the responsibility of the nine regional enterprise plans which focus on initiatives to deliver growth in each of the nine regions of Ireland. The programme for government commits to considering the development of economic strategic development zones for the region's strategic development zone as they have been until now is a planning designation and typically follows by the development of a planning scheme for the SDZ by the relative local authority. My department has engaged with Ireland West Airport NOC SDZ including the provision of over €200,000 per year over a two-year period to Mayo County Council for the development of a roadmap for the development of the SDZ project manager for this work was appointed last year in August. The project manager is developing the roadmap setting out the process for the development of the SDZ including identification of required infrastructure to advance the site, identification of challenges facing the development and also facilitating access of findings to deliver on specific project elements as well as supporting the communication of the vision of the SDZ at a local level and with other interested parties. The work of the project manager is overseen by its steering committee which is chaired by Mayo County Council and includes representatives from key stakeholders including the IDA, Enterprise Ireland, the Western Development Commission, the North West Regional Assembly, Atlantic Technological University, Ireland West Airport NOC and my own department. The most recent meeting from the steering committee that took place back in December with the next meeting now expected for March. Officials of my department have also liaised with the relevant government departments and state bodies on issues of relevance to the SDZ. Marduf, Hawthorne. A gore mh agathean, co gore ddeus, Minister, on your new role as well and this is one thing we share in relation to NOC Airport and the development there. Now we have talked about it for years upon years and for decades since Monsignor Horne was brave enough to come out and against all of the odds to build the airport there but it has not fulfilled its potential. That is obvious as well. In 2022 the EU downgraded the North and West as a lagging region with a GDP of only 71% of the EU average. Last year the North Western Regional Assembly published research showing that the North and Western region received just 5.7% of investment in infrastructure projects worth more than 20 million since 2016. So the facts speak for themselves but we have a unique opportunity here but it is not going to happen unless we all work together and that is why in all of this I want to see what this road map looks like and I want to see that it will be measured along the way to exactly who is responsible for moving it along and how that will be done and when it will be done. Thank you Deputy and I think we are all in agreement that this is certainly a critical piece of enterprise enabling infrastructure for the region, for the West, for the North West. I know we have support here also from Minister Burke and Minister Smith who are also regional ministers and the development does require, as you said, focus and a commitment. I do welcome the appointment of Dominic Keeley back in August last year, a very competent project manager. The road map will build on the consensus of the steering committee stakeholders, as I said, which comprise of a number of state agencies and key local authorities. The completion timeline of two years has been set by the SDZ development road map. We have a timeline of August 2026, two years after the appointment of the project manager, and we do want to see, following that, a number of initiatives then to ensure that we have investment into that actual strategic land bank to ensure that we have critical services, utilities, and we have a plan going forward to ensure and attract investment. I think it is really important as well that people's expectations are not risen in this, because you see before elections you have all these nonsensical announcements and all that. You really are looking at a 10-year period before this is going to be done, if you are talking about utilities and all of that that needs to be done to develop this zone. There are things that can be done in the meantime, but I think people's expectations need to be managed in it, but we have a critical opportunity here. In 2021 Sinn Féin wrote to the European Commission seeking a total exemption from state aid rules for regional airports such as Ireland West due to the challenges of Brexit and of COVID-19. I want to ask as well Minister, will you consider pursuing this objective to enable Ireland West Airport SDZ to reach its full potential as well? We have no Western Rail Corridor and the All-Island Strategic Rail Review was grim reading for the North West as well. All of these issues are interconnected, but they all present a unique opportunity that we cannot wait to have implemented. Thank you very much Deputy, but what I will say is that this Government has been steadfast in its support for Ireland West Airport NOC to the regional airports programme. Over €20 million has been invested in key infrastructure projects and safety and security projects at the airport. We see record passenger numbers again this year and the trajectory for that airport is important. Working with the Board of Ireland West Airport NOC, they are working in relation to attracting investment, we see aircraft maintenance companies who have set up there already. This work is crucially important and through the previous Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and former Minister Simon Coveney, we did move this on to ensure that we had a feasibility study. Minister Cleary was also very supportive within the department and we all need to work collectively on this to ensure that it does reach its full potential because the SDZ certainly has the potential to open up the Atlantic Economic Corridor and, as you said, key infrastructure projects like the Western Railroad Corridor is critical also to its viability.