‘All-Island Rail Review has shown utter contempt for the people of Donegal’

A former member of the Western Development Commission claims if the government could, they’d push Donegal onto an “uninhabitable granite islet in the North Atlantic Ocean.”

Falcarragh-based Dr Seosamh Ó Ceallaigh - a teacher, historian and author - commented following the release of the 2024 All-Island Rail Review (AIRR), which recommends a new rail link from Letterkenny to Derry. It does not support further rail links in the county such as reviving the closed line between Letterkenny and Donegal Town, or going into Inishowen or west Donegal.

“If they could dig a trench and push Donegal and the North West out towards Rockall the Government and their officials would do so,” Dr Ó Ceallaigh said. “Rockall is an uninhabitable granite islet in the North Atlantic Ocean - Rockall with nothing at all.

“The government's newly released 2024 All-Island Rail Review has shown utter contempt for the people of Donegal and Border Region. We are abandoned yet again. Of the proposed cost of €37 billion, in this national Railway Report, it is suggested that only 20 kilometres of Donegal may get €200-€300 million of the estimated budget.

“That spend suggestion is just over 1% of the overall national spend and subject to government and Stormont approval. In other words, 99% of this rail budget will be spent outside Donegal. Clearly, the All-Island Rail Review is money for the rest, not the west, money for Dublin, not Donegal.

“The report confirms, on Page 13: ‘This is an indicative artistic interpretation…The pathways delineated in this illustration are conceptual in nature and should not be interpreted as a precise or literal depiction of potential routes or route corridors.’
In other words, it is a work of fiction.”

The review was committed to as part of the 2020 New Decade, New Approach agreement that ended a long period without devolved government in Northern Ireland, with the implementation of all recommendations by 2050.

“It’s election time and looking back at other election promises: Letterkenny was promised an airport - it didn’t happen: Donegal was promised a gas line into Derry - it didn’t happen: Donegal was promised reliable energy supplies - it didn’t happen: Dual carriageways - it didn’t happen.

“There is no political will to provide competitive infrastructure or do anything for Donegal. The false hope, from D2, that a mere single-track rail connection into Derry in this new report will happen, sometime in the far distant future, is insulting and fictitious.

“Furthermore, on page 133, the Railway Report states: ‘The ‘Modelling undertaken’ for the Northwest of Ireland ‘showed there would be very low demand for passenger rail services on this route and that building a railway on this corridor would have a significant adverse impact on the environment.’

“This single statement from the report declares that one-third of the land mass of Ireland will continue to be neglected. It also reveals that our government is more interested in emission and emigration than in the people of the Donegal, Border Region, The West and North-West.

“For the first time, Donegal and the Border Region does not have an MEP. There’s no voice in Europe and no voices in Dublin fighting for us. We have to demand recognition and stop being treated like ‘Europe’s and Dublin’s National Park’.

“It is time for Donegal County Councillors to convene an urgent meeting, review this abandonment, bring all the County Councils on the Western Seaboard together and insist on the Billions of Euros necessary for investment in Donegal, The West and the Region. Councillors are the voice of the electorate and are best placed to represent the needs and concerns of the people.

“Families and businesses carry a disproportionate taxation burden, with no infrastructure benefits to show for it. Our young people will continue to leave, never to return. Dublin 2 needs to get the message that in advance of their election, this newly released All-Island Strategic Rail Review fails to deliver.

“The taxpaying people of Donegal and the West can no longer sit in silence. We exist, we pay our taxes, we want our well overdue fair share and we must stop the exodus, from families, of young people from our region.”