Standing up for rural Ireland
Sinn Féin launched our party’s Defending Rural Ireland campaign in early March 2012 in Castlebar, County Mayo.
This discussion document is the culmination of a year-long series of grassroots community engagements and consultation across rural Ireland led by the Sinn Féin leadership as part of this campaign.
Through our direct community engagements throughout the length and breadth of Ireland, Sinn Féin have both met and listened to local people, families, businesses and service providers. They have all voiced their unique experience of how the Government policy of austerity is impacting on their daily lives and livelihoods and how the burden of cuts is threatening the future sustainability of rural Ireland and the rural way of life.
The objective of the discussion document is to both identify and catalogue this local experience and lead the debate as to what change is required to reverse this cycle of decline. The report also sets out clear and constructive alternative approaches of how we can support and sustain rural Ireland by securing a fairer deal for rural households, create and retain jobs in rural communities, protect rural schools and services, ensure equal access to health services and maximise support for our Gaeltacht areas.