I too extend my condolences to the families and friends of Aidan Moffitt and Michael Snee. I recognise Anthony Burke whose brave testimony was pivotal. I also thank An Garda Síochána for its untiring work in bringing the perpetrator to justice.

Today I again raise the non-delivery of balanced regional development, particularly in the context of this year's budget. I also raise the submission made by the Northern and Western Regional Assembly, which has drafted a submission asking for three things - a stimulus package of €570 million for the region between now and 2027, a policy of positive discrimination for the region and more regional autonomy. The document clearly sets out the reasons for the three requests. First, regional inequalities are rising in Ireland. In 2010, the gap in disposable income between the northern and western region and the eastern and midland region was ten percentage points. By 2021, that gap had grown to an astonishing 25 percentage points. Second, census 2022 data illustrate that population growth continues to be unsustainably uneven. Third, while employment levels across all regions are high, the northern and western region has a below-average concentration of jobs involved in the knowledge and technology economy, which are the jobs of the future. Fourth, according to the European Commission, the region has been downgraded to lagging, with the Border region described as being in a development trap. In the northern and western region, per capita GDP is now 17% below the EU average, despite the fact that in 2006 our per capita GDP was 5% above the EU average. That is a pretty grim picture.

One sector not dealt with by this report, but of crucial importance in the region is tourism. We see that the counties with the highest proportion of their tourism accommodation being used to accommodate refugees are along the Atlantic coastline, with a report last March showing that 82% of Fáilte Ireland-registered tourist beds in County Donegal were being used to accommodate refugees. The figure was 42% in County Sligo and 50% in County Leitrim. The downstream impact is huge, yet the budget was silent and disappointing on the asks from the regional assembly. What will the Taoiseach do to improve the ranking of this region vis-à-vis other regions on the European competitiveness index?

I neglected to recall Anthony Burke's name earlier. I pay tribute to him in particular and the fact he went to the gardaí and gave them the crucial information that enabled them to apprehend the man who carried out the terrible murders of Aidan Moffitt and Michael Snee in Sligo. I pay tribute to him and recognise An Garda Síochána and its work.

What we are doing and will continue to do is make balanced regional development happen in Ireland. That is something we are doing under this Government, and which we did under its predecessors. In the last census, for the first time in quite some time, the population in every county increased. We have not seen that for quite some time, and that is of real significance. We have the Department of Rural and Community Development under the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, with a fund of €1 billion to invest in rural areas in particular. Everyone who travels the country can now see the impact of that on the ground in towns and villages all over Ireland. We have seen employment rise in every county, which again is something of real importance and significance.

It is not just the employment rate going down; the number of actual jobs in each county has gone up. We have seen the development of the technological universities, which make a huge difference. The Deputy will be familiar with Atlantic Technological University, ATU, which has a campus in Sligo.

Through the IDA property programme, all over the country we are building advanced factories, so that if we take a potential investor to a regional town, they can see a business park or building ready for them to get into. We see how that has worked in Castlebar, Kilkenny and other places. The national broadband plan is connecting every home, farm and business to fibre, something virtually no other country is doing, and will really make a difference to running a business in rural Ireland or a farm and being able to access online healthcare and education.

Regarding the infrastructure budget, the biggest single investment signed off on this year for any part of the country is the upgrade of the N5, the Tulsk to Scramoge road. That is a €500 million investment in improving access to the west.

Those are the kinds of things we are doing. Of course, we need to do much more. It is a challenge for any country to spread development away from the capital and the big cities. Almost all countries struggle with it - look at Copenhagen in Denmark and Vienna in Austria – but we are getting some good results.

The Taoiseach gave a few statistics there but he has been in power since 2011 and the figures I quoted are not my figures. They come from the regional assembly report. The Taoiseach can see the economic gap is increasing. He might not like it and I do not like it, but it has to tell him the actions he and his Government are taking are not working. He tells us the population has increased in every county and it has, but the proportionate increase in the counties I am speaking of is much lower. It is still unsustainably uneven. He talks of increasing employment and is absolutely right, but our level of employment in the jobs of the future and high-value jobs is well below the national average. He tells us the TUs are valuable and they are. They are right across the country and we are getting our fair share, I am glad to say. He mentioned the IDA property programme. Will he ring-fence some of that for the region? Will he ring-fence our fair share or look at a bit of positive discrimination? That is needed to ensure we rebalance the imbalance that is there.

There are many ways to measure things. The Deputy’s focus has been mainly on GDP and relativities. That is a fair argument but when it comes to judging economic success and progress, I would never use GDP as the most important measure.

I used six different ones.

The most important measures are jobs, employment, incomes, businesses and investment. When it comes to the IDA, which the Deputy mentioned, of the 139 new investments made last year, over half were outside of Dublin, which was very significant. Enterprise Ireland works with Irish-owned exporting companies and over two thirds of new jobs created by Enterprise Ireland companies were outside of Dublin.

Our job as Government is to listen to everybody’s case and argument. The Deputy makes a very strong case for the north west, which she should as a Deputy from Sligo. I could hear Deputies from the south east – and I see their heads nodding-----

I am making it for the region.

-----who could equally make a very strong case for positive discrimination for the south east. I could equally hear people from the Dublin city region who will say what is lost to Dublin is often lost to Ireland because only Dublin can compete with Singapore and San Francisco for certain investments and jobs. It is the Government’s job to balance that and try to get it right.