Relax rural planning laws, says Fogarty

MUNSTER COUNCIL chairman Sean Fogarty has called on local authorities to relax planning laws in an effort to assist the GAA in rural areas.

Mr Fogarty is concerned that strict planning legislation is preventing people from returning to live in rural communities — and clubs are suffering as a result.

Said Mr Fogarty: “If we, as an association, don’t take action to prevent the drain from the land, many of our rural clubs will fold due to lack of numbers. Already clubs are having problems fielding teams. I believe the GAA should highlight and indeed lobby against this trend with the relevant authorities as a matter of urgency.”

He continued: “My own club Moyne-Templetuohy, for instance, gave a walkover recently in a minor game because we couldn’t field 15 players due to a suspension and a player being ill. We simply don’t have the numbers. Thankfully we were allowed back into the competition and are now doing well in it. We need to look at the over-populated areas of the big towns and perhaps the families in the rural areas of those towns would be permitted to play with the rural clubs.

“Alternatively first generation families from rural areas now living in urban areas should be permitted to declare for the club of their parents. I don’t see the amalgamation of clubs as the answer. If you do that you could lose your parish identity.”

“With every passing year more and more of our young people dream of building a home in a rural setting, but that dream often turns into a nightmare due to the difficulties in obtaining planning permission.

“Of course the long term solution in my view is that the local authorities would make every effort to preserve the rural parishes. If they would ease up on the planning laws, allow more homes to be built in rural Ireland the whole country would benefit, not just the GAA.

“Every effort should be made to preserve a vibrant rural Ireland and our planners have a huge say in that. Ireland is unique in that our whole society is built around parish pride, people coming out and giving of their time to keep the parish up there.”