Concentrate on job creation

HOUSES seem to have become an obsession for the senior farmer organisations.

They got in the way of a more critical response which one could have expected from IFA and ICMSA to the new National Spatial Strategy, the latest instalment in 50 years of failed regional development.

IFA made the expected noises about recognising the need for balanced regional development, but gave an enthusiastic welcome for the confirmation that rurally generated housing needs would be met in the rural areas where they arise. For ICMSA, the critically important point in the Strategy was that rural people should be able to build houses in their home areas.