A Mayo Fine Gael councillor has called out a government announcement yesterday on funding for Active Travel as “farcical”.

Minister Eamon Ryan and Minister of State Jack Chambers with the NTA yesterday announced that the government has spent a billion euro on safer walking ad cycling routes over the pat four years and in addition announced 4 million euro in funding this year for over 30 projects in Mayo.

However, councillor Sheridan says the reality is if you look in detail at the funding announced yesterday most of it was announced previously and worse than that if you look at detail at the allocations in the Castlebar area, up to seven projects have in fact had their allocations reduced.

Councillor Sheridan says Minister Ryan announced €695,800 in 2023 for seven projects in Castlebar and yesterday he sliced the funding completely for two of those seven projects and reduced the other five projects to €220,000 and re-announced them.

While the only new project allocated to the district yesterday was €100,000 to be spent on consultants “to tell us how to build a footpath”.

Councillor Sheridan is now calling on Ministers Ryan and Chambers to restore and increase the funding for the Castlebar District for the seven projects announced last year and to stop announcing funds and then cutting funding to the disappointment of local communities and council officials who have spent time and resources developing plans.

She has been speaking to Midwest News Editor Teresa O'Malley...