What's The Point Of Rural Action Plan?

/ 22nd April 2017 /

With Brexit looming, is the government wasting its time with the Action Plan for Rural Development, wonders Nick Mulcahy

The wheels of government grind slowly, often very slowly. People outside the Pale have been complaining forever that they get a raw deal from administrators in Dublin. What they really mean is that market forces are passing them by and they want intervention using taxpayer-funded subsidies and projects of one sort or another. Eventually government takes notice, as over half the electorate still live outside cities and towns.

At the moment it’s Fine Gael’s turn to listen up. The party got the rural ball rolling when Phil Hogan was still a minister. In November 2012 he established the Commission for the Economic Development of Rural Areas (CEDRA) and that body made a number of recommendations in November 2013.

These informed the development of the Charter for Rural Ireland, published in January 2016. That document included a commitment to develop a policy framework to support the economic, social and cultural development of rural Ireland. One year on, and more than four years after CEDRA was established, the government has formulated a new Action Plan for Rural Development.

Banal Actions

One of CEDRA’s main recommendations was that rural Ireland matters should be brought under the ambit of the Minister for Local Government, but Taoiseach Enda Kenny thought otherwise. When forming the new government in 2016, Kenny whipped away rural and regional responsibilities from patrician Simon Coveney’s department and lumped them into the Department of Arts, Heritage and Gaeltacht Affairs.

That department’s minister, Heather Humphreys (pictured), has proper rural credentials, as she lives on a farm in a remote part of Cavan. Her department how has the distinction of having the longest acronym – DAHRRGA – and is also in charge of an Action Plan with possibly the most actions – 276. Humphreys has been tasked with reaching out across government and state agencies to ensure that these actions are actioned, and Enda will summon his minister every six months for an action update.

The only thing missing from Enda and Heather’s Rural Action Plan is the kitchen sink. Every ongoing government and agency measure that impacts on rural Ireland has been included in the hundreds of ‘actions’. Some samples from the enterprise ‘pillar’:

Continue to build on the LEO communications strategy to communicate the range of supports and services available at local level.
Develop, enhance and promote the effectiveness of the Origin Green programme as a key marketing tool for the Irish agri-food sector.
Deliver, through the Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland, effective financial supports to SMEs
Through the Social Inclusion and Community Activation programme, support the establishment and development of social enterprises in rural areas.

There’s much more besides, most of it equally banal, though with a few new ideas too. The Taoiseach appears to be a big fan of action plans, and he likes the way the process worked when Richard Bruton was in charge of the Action Plans for Jobs. Humphreys is one of Kenny’s favourites, though whether the former credit union manager has similar clout to Bruton or Coveney across the civil service is doubtful.

DAHRRGA has also become involved in the National Broadband Plan fiasco. Beefing up rural broadband is the single most important measure government can help with to assist entrepreneurs, and the previous Fine Gael/Labour government promised a universal 30MB broadband service everywhere in the country. A year ago it was envisaged that contracts for the NBP would have been awarded last autumn. Instead the whole process is bogged down by the European Union stricture that state broadband can’t crowd out the private sector players.

In the new Rural Action Plan, Action No.232 is: “Implement the National Broadband Plan to provide high speed broadband to every premises in Ireland”. The timeline for this action is stated as ‘ongoing’.

Opaque Leader

There is more taxpayers’ money for rural measures in 2017 than last year. Half of the €79m budget allocation goes to Leader, the opaque mom and pop funding programme administered by local authorities into micro business, rural tourism, social inclusion and rural environment.

Funding for rural development schemes, outside Leader, is doubling this year to €15m, and grants for town and village regeneration are tripling to €12m. In total, Humphreys’ department has €18m more to play with on regional development than it did in 2016. However, as all the 1916 palaver is done with, the overall 2017 budget for DAHRRGA has been cut by €15m.

Meanwhile, what the state gives with one hand it takes with the other. Hundreds of businesses west of the Shannon have been informed recently that they face massive hikes in commercial rates in 2018 on foot of new property valuations conducted by the Valuation Office. The Action Plan for Rural Development saw this one coming. Action No.75 says: “Determine the feasibility of enabling local authorities to introduce rates alleviation schemes to support rural development policy objectives”.

In the CEDRA report, it was noted that the aspirations of rural communities today are not significantly different to those identified in the White Paper on rural development in 1999, or indeed in the discourse around the subject in the 1880s. “Not only are the aspirations similar but the solutions to the identified challenges have a number of similarities that centre on the need for a more integrated and territorial approach to support for rural economic development.”

Rural Economic Development Zones

What CEDRA had in mind here was that while local funding has traditionally been channeled through local authorities, there are many areas where a city or town’s hinterland crosses county boundaries. CEDRA’s solution, now adopted by government, is the idea of Rural Economic Development Zones.

There are now 145 RED zones around the country, grouped in three regions. In 2016 they competed for a funding pot of €5.3m, with grant-aid of between 50% and 80% available for winning projects. They have the merit of incentivising councils and community groups to pull the finger out and do something for their locality, though their sustainability is a moot point (see listing below).

The wider questions is whether heritage centres and walking routes can arrest the economic decline of rural areas. In common with most countries, people who have the misfortune to be born in the back-end of nowhere migrate to where the jobs are. In its Rural Action Plan, the government concedes: “Contemporary households need to be located in places where there is access to both spouses’ workplace. This is particularly true of households where the couple each have a third level qualification.”

Brexit Looms

The objectives of the Rural Action Plan, and the Regional Action Plans for Jobs, are to enable people to continue to live and work in rural Ireland if they wish to do so. The agri-food sector, including primary farming and fishing, employs around 163,000 people, and the potential exposure of rural Ireland to the trade impact of Brexit is high.

The Rural Action Plan states: “The sectors of the economy most exposed to the impact of Brexit are mostly regionally based SMEs with low profit margins. They account for a relatively high share of employment in regions which already have experienced a slower labour market recovery since the financial crisis period. Rural Ireland is particularly dependent on these sectors and is less well-placed to be able to replace businesses that ultimately may be lost as a result of Brexit.”

In short, the rural action plans, which soak up a lot of political and civil service attention, are the equivalent of a finger in the dyke. Maybe the Taoiseach and his colleagues should be more concerned with fast-tracking new accommodation and transport infrastructure in the cities and large towns to cater for inevitable future migration from the four green fields.

SAMPLE RED ZONE PROJECTS

• Ardee: eCommerce programme to deliver improvements in quality of life for older people
• Banagher: enhance town around marina.
• Mullingar: Royal Canal to Lough Owel cycleway extension.
• Corlea: walking route.
• Kells: continued development of International Technology Hub.
• Arklow: Heritage Centre based on Arklow Pottery.
• Birr Castle: Education Centre.
• Bailieborough: redevelopment of courthouse as tourism hub.
• Dunree Fort: coffee shop and pier facilities.
• Westport: conversion of vacant commercial property into enterprise centre.
• Castlerea: Food Hub to train new food producers.
• Carrickmacross: develop Market House for multipurpose use.
• Ballinmore: Angling Centre.
• Ox Mountain Sligo: Mountain Biking Centre.
• Dunmore East: upgrading work to the existing coastal path for a cliff walk.
• Bunclody: running of festivals and events linked to artisan foods.
• Kilmallock/Charleville: Engineering Hub and development of Loop Walk.
• Beara Bridle Way: horse riding trail.
• Killarney: trail repair on McGillycuddy Reeks.