My vision for Louth, Drogheda & East Meath

            Ged's priorities for Louth

Cost of Living:

Ireland is too expensive and it’s working people who are paying the price. I have led the charge nationally against high household bills. In government, Labour will take on the profiteering big companies and deliver for families.

Better public transport:

I will continue to campaign to secure better and more frequent rail services between Dundalk and Dublin, the re-opening of Dunleer Train Station, the delivery of the Ardee By-Pass and a modern, fit-for-purpose school transport system across Louth & East Meath.

Young citizens with Additional Needs:

I will deliver on Labour’s commitment to an ‘Autism Guarantee’ of school places for all children and a step-change in the provision of services and supports for children with additional needs and their families.

Jobs and Investment: 

Economic plans I have published will see the State do more for Irish firms to support local job creators in Louth and help create the sustainable jobs of the future in our locality.

Ged's Priorities and Vision for Drogheda

We need more jobs and investment: Let's reverse the commute!

• The impending closure of BD is another bitter blow for Drogheda jobs and the town's job base.  Drogheda has not received its fair share of IDA investment.  The authority has backed up to 3,500 jobs in 24 companies in Dundalk, while in Drogheda, it has delivered a maximum of 950 jobs in nine firms and falling.

• The Drogheda Implementation Board was a Labour-inspired response to gang crime in our town.  It helped transform the approach to community development in the area.  The same integrated approach must be taken to local job creation.

• On 'Day One' if elected to government, I will establish a High-Level Task Force for Jobs and Investment in Drogheda to take a multi-agency, plan-led approach, to the creation of good jobs and sustainable local economic development.

Housing you can afford: Let's build the affordable and public homes we need

• The government's 'Housing for All' plan has proven to be a case of housing for the very few!  Tackling the housing crisis has been the Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil government's greatest failure.  Their policies have created an Ireland of winners and losers. Record house prices. Record Rents. Record homelessness. 
• In Louth, homelessness has risen under this government and a modest home has never been more expensive! Labour has a different approach to this problem and it's one I believe can put a roof over everyone's head in Drogheda, at a price working people can afford.
• Labour has proposed using a significant portion of the Apple tax windfall to establish a State Construction Company.
• This Construction Company will allow a government with Labour involvement to dramatically boost the nation's capacity for home building and increase the delivery of housing far beyond the inadequate targets set by the outgoing government, targets which they have failed to meet anyway.

Reviving our Town Centre: Let's declare war on vacancy and derelicition!

• Nobody has worked harder than the local Labour team on tackling Drogheda's dereliction problem. We have pioneered the West Gate Public Realm Vision, which can help transform this neglected part of our town.

• Sucessive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Ministers for Finance (as recently as last month's Finance Bill) have lined up to bury my proposals to include Drogheda in the Living Cities initiative, an urban regeneration tax break provided to smaller cities like Kilkenny, but denied to us. Dereliction is a form of official vandalism. Labour has proposed making it easier for Councils to take charge of buildings and to put them to good use as homes, businesses and cultural spaces.

• This can be done through a streamlining of the Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) process and a new Compulsory Sales Order system, modelled on the Scottish system. In additon, by introducing my proposals to let the Revenue Commissioners collect derelict sites levies, this would impact the ability of rogue property owners who don't pay up to run their businesses. I have also proposed that the legal definition of a derelict site in Irish law must be changed and modernised to stop rogue site owners evading their responsiblities. I am also working to have the Council take over the Abbey Centre site.

Bringing Town Government Back: Let's restore Drogheda Borough Council!

• Drogheda needs its own local authority that can act in the interests of the town and wider region.
• Labour remains the only party to put forward a Bill to restore borough and town councils and the time has come to have them re-established, particularly in Drogheda.
• The ultimate ambition is to achieve city status and install a city government to go with it, but the restoration of a council would be a crucial and achievable step in bringing local decision-making back to Drogheda.

Delivering our stadium - let's invest in our sports infrastructure.

• As a lifelong supporter of Drogheda United, I was extremely disappointed that the government failed to back our club's application for funding under the Large-Scale Sports Infrastructure Fund (LSSIF). If elected to the next Dáil and to government, I pledge to have the stadium project funded and to deliver a step-change in the funding of football in Ireland.  Aligned with the plans for municipal sports pitches in North Drogheda, the planning for which will commence in 2025, I support calls for the development of a new multi-use indoor sports and community facility for our growing small city.

North Drogheda Playground: Let’s invest in our children and young people!

• Huge growth of our town is underway, especially to the north, and that part of our town is poorly served with play facilities for children. My colleague Cllr. Pio Smith and I are pleased to have delivered on a commitment from the Council to build a playground at The Glen on the Newfoundwell Road.
• This is a welcome first step but as the community grows north of the river, I will be pushing for play and recreational facilities to keep pace with housing development in the north of our town. Cllr. Michelle Hall and I are working to deliver the ‘linear park’ in proximity to the Port Access Northern Cross Route (PANCR).

Making the Boyne a town asset: Let’s embrace and protect our river!

• The Boyne River is a largely unexploited asset for Drogheda and I want to see that change. I am proud to have sponsored a Bill in the Dáil that would establish a task force to protect the Boyne. I believe the river is central to the town’s future, and proud to have had the Hebble Sand dredger removed from the quays and safely decommissioned.
• I was instrumental in the decision by the State to purchase the Dowth Hall Demense for a National Park. Drogheda’s place as an historic town on the majestic Boyne and as a gateway to the Boyne Valley makes it a draw for tourism.  I want visitors to our town, as well as locals, to be able to enjoy the river safely with enhanced walks, the promised cycle-way along it, and to provide for water-based activities on the river itself.
• Similarly, it is critical that the Drogheda Port Company develops a sustainable 'Master Plan' along the town quays to allow this large area to be regenerated and developed for housing, commercial, social and cultural purposes.

Delivering better rail services: Let’s build the North Drogheda train station!

• Drogheda is a commuter town and I have a proud record in fighting for a fair deal for Drogheda commuters. As the town expands to the north, there is a need to deliver a second train station for North Drogheda and I want to drive that project forward in the next Dáil as well if elected to government. Similarly, I want to prioritise the concept of a new ‘M1 Rail Line’ as recommended in the recent all-island rail review.
• We need to learn from the costly mistakes of the past and ensure there is not the need to retrofit crucial economic and social infrastructure like transport links, parks, schools and playing pitches into North Drogheda. These facilities need to be in place before residents have moved in.

Education, education, education: Let’s deliver the new schools and facilities we need!

• This government has dragged its heels in delivering the local schools we need to service an expanding population. Local schools like Drogheda Educate Together Secondary School have had to fight long campaigns to win the school facilities their community deserves. In 2015, I secured the money for the new St. Ita’s/St. Mary’s school on a site on the Cement Road. Under this government, progress has been too slow.

• Perhaps there is no better local example of the endless foot-dragging and buck-passing by FF and FG Ministers of Education than the never-ending wait to deliver a new headquarters for the Louth & Meath Education and Training Board at St Oliver’s Community College. Eleven years ago, a Labour Minister accepted my case to locate the building in Drogheda and more than a decade later, FF and FG have dropped the ball and we are still waiting.

Drogheda as an ‘active travel’ town: Let’s make cycling and walking safer!

• The future of our environment and as well as improved health and wellbeing depends on all of us cycling and walking more. Things are improving, but cyclists, pedestrians and citizens with mobility issues are poorly served.
• Over the next decade, our focus must be to make Drogheda an ‘active travel’ town, with the provision of safe cycling and pedestrian spaces, enhanced town bus services (building on our delivery of the D4 and D5 Bus Services, for example) and less reliance on private cars.

Let’s deliver the permanent Driving Test Centre Drogheda needs!

• Drogheda has been let down time and again by the Road Safety Authority in our efforts to have a permanent Driving Test Centre in what is Ireland’s largest town.
• In addition, the RSA refused to keep a temporary centre in our town until such time as a permanent centre is delivered.
• In the next Dail, efforts to deliver the permanent centre by a reformed authority responsible for testing, will be redoubled.