Fine Gael has described today’s report by the Western Development Commission (WDC) on the ‘State of the West’, as a serious wake up call for the Government.
According to the report, failure at central government level is to blame for the persistent disadvantage experienced by the western region.
The report also warns that unless the Government acts immediately to improve roads and infrastructure in the west, a technical and communications gap will develop that will be impossible to bridge.
Fine Gael’s western development spokesman Mr Gerry Reynolds said the Government must stop ignoring what he called "the ever increasing regional divide which has resulted from Government mismanagement and a continued lack of investment."
Deputy Reynolds echoed the report’s claim that the lack of investment in road and rail networks along with the weak power and telecommunications infrastructure are contributing to the western region’s lack of competitiveness.
"This report highlights the fact that for the last four years the Government has been content to bury its head in the sand and hope the problems of the western region will somehow, mysteriously, resolve themselves," he said.
The WDC report states that apart from Galway city and parts of Clare, the west of Ireland is attracting a fraction of inward investment and much of its industrial base is weak.
It also warned the west is falling behind rather than catching up with the rest of the country and the deregulation of services such as electricity, gas and telecommunications will worsen the regional divide.
Fine Gael has published a series of proposals which it claims could move the West of Ireland "up a gear".
These include setting up a Regional Development Department to oversee balanced regional development across the country, the establishment of a university in Sligo, and the decentralisation of government departments to provincial towns.