I wish to raise an issue about Shannon Airport and balanced regional development. This week in The Clare Champion, Limerick Leader, and no doubt other local newspapers in the mid-west there are one and a half page broadsheet advertisements devoted to what appears to be a joint Dublin Airport and Aer Lingus marketing campaign to persuade those of us stuck in the rain in the mid-west to fly off to Spain through Dublin Airport. It even explains how we can bypass Shannon Airport by getting various bus services to Dublin Airport. It is a raw and unapologetic attempt to cannibalise passengers from Shannon Airport. This is not the first campaign like this. One was also carried out last year. The Dublin Airport Authority operates Dublin and Cork airports. It has a throughput of passengers of 27 million. The throughput of passengers through Shannon is 1.7 million. The irony of this is that Cork and Dublin airports are publicly owned while Shannon Airport is independent.

Fair enough, one might say. This is a competitive world and dog can eat dog. However, we have a commitment from this Government to develop rural Ireland and promote balanced regional development, which was enshrined in A Programme for a Partnership Government.

The Action Plan for Rural Development has been published. This is the first ever whole-of-Government strategy aimed at delivering real change for people in rural Ireland and, in February, the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, Deputy Coveney, launched Ireland 2040, a consultative process, in an effort to look ahead and to shape long-term planning for the country over the next 20 years. All of these plans are necessary to protect our future, yet people living in rural Ireland wonder whether there will be anything worthwhile left in their areas by the time they are implemented - if they are implemented. The fabric of rural Ireland is unravelling, with emigration happening as a result of a lack of infrastructure, a lack of job opportunities and the uncertainty which Brexit brings, particularly to our agricultural community.

The Shannon Airport situation is a good example of a large, State-owned airport in Dublin pillaging business from a small State-owned company in the mid-west. Somebody must shout "Stop" and ask if this is acceptable. I hope the Taoiseach will tell me that this kind of behaviour on the part of a largely publicly owned company against a smaller neighbour is not acceptable and that activities such as this, which undermine Shannon's viability, are incompatible with the promotion of balanced regional development in the mid-west.

A number of years ago, the Government made a decision to give Shannon Airport freedom to do its own business and it has improved greatly since then.

No.

The optimism I feel about Shannon is voiced by many people in business in the mid-west region. Deputy Harty will look at the increase in employment and investment in the greater region in recent years and see clearly that Shannon has a very bright future. It is not for me to decide whether Aer Lingus and the DAA advertise by whatever method. Some 120,000 people from the north-west would have travelled either to Dublin or to Shannon to fly to America in the past 12 months. We are aware of those figures. Competition in advertising is one thing but the loyalty of people from the Shannon region to their own locality is manifest, I am quite sure. I am not sure of the airport connections to the locations the Deputy has mentioned but, clearly, these connections are increasing in number on an annual basis. Unprecedented numbers of people are coming into Ireland and significant numbers are travelling abroad for business or for holidays now that the economy has improved.

The programme for Government sets out the objectives for the development of rural Ireland, with 135,000 of the 200,000 jobs to be in regional Ireland, with the programme announced last week by the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment in respect of the broadband programme and with the opportunity for the development and attraction of inward investment by IDA Ireland. In addition, the improvements in staff and finances to enable Enterprise Ireland to help small and medium enterprises, both the vulnerable and those which are able to export to new areas, speak for themselves.

I am not sure the one-page advertisements in local newspapers which the Deputy mentioned are going to sway the people of the mid-west to travel to Dublin in order to fly to their destinations. People will go where they wish to go. In fact, I remember when all the trouble used to be about Shannon Airport and the landings there from America before aeroplanes would land in Dublin. I remember the late Tony Ryan saying to me down in Shannon, "Let them fly where they want because that is what they will do anyway". It is a very competitive business and it is not for me to say that Dublin Airport or Aer Lingus should not advertise. Obviously, Shannon has its own capacity to get its own message out, and it is a very good message.

The reason I raised this issue is not necessarily in respect of the advertising but in the context of the dominance that Dublin Airport is exerting over air travel in this country. There is a proposal to build a new runway at Dublin Airport and it may actually have a new terminal in years to come. This is creating an imbalance in the country and in air travel in and out of Ireland. Ireland needs an effective counterbalance to Dublin and to the eastern regional economy.

Hear, hear.

This also applies to broadband, as the Taoiseach has mentioned, and to transport, health and education. We need to address the spatial imbalance that is developing today and is accelerating. Allowing Dublin Airport to dominate entry and exit by air is overheating the Dublin economy, which does not have the infrastructure to cope. The Atlantic economic corridor and other regions must not be undermined by Dublin Airport, which seeks to attain almost total dominance in air travel.

Deputy Harty is well versed in the programme for rural development, which provides opportunities and, indeed, incentives for communities and regions to benefit from it. Clearly, the Deputy is aware Norwegian Airlines added four flights from Cork and Shannon to North America this year. The numbers coming back in from there will be unprecedented. Tourism Ireland is actively looking at the regional marketing of the west, with a focus on the Wild Atlantic Way, servicing Shannon and other surrounding locations. The figures show ten million visitors to Ireland, 230,000 jobs and expenditure of €5 billion in the hospitality area alone. Consider the small and medium enterprises and the scale of inward investment. Clearly, Shannon, given the nature of the development of the aircraft business, has very clear opportunities. With airports in Knock further north and in Cork, Dublin and Belfast, the island has opportunities. It is all changing, as the Deputy is aware, with more efficient engines and airlines and more people wish to come here. Thanks be to God, Ireland is a safe location to visit and we hope to keep it that way. Clearly, the mid-west has changed utterly in the past ten years. Long may it and other areas continue to prosper in the time ahead. Shannon is a central focus of the mid-west, just as Knock is to the west and north west and Cork is to the south west. Dublin, of course, is a city that is going to grow very strongly again in the next 15 to 20 years.