Rose Conway-Walsh warns city job concentration threatens regional incomes

Minister, I want to ask you about the disparity in income levels across the state, and specifically to ask you what you are doing to ensure that well-paid jobs are not only centralised to the major urban areas, but that they also spread out to the regions. I and many other rural and regional TDs stand here week in, week out, asking for fairness and balanced regional investment to attract secure and well-paid jobs to our regions. We have an over-concentration of high-paid unemployment in major urban centres, forcing people to relocate or to commute long hours just to access employment opportunities. The programme for Government sets out a strong enterprise and fiscal framework that prioritises economic growth and employment. Last year the Irish labour market saw sustained employment growth and the rising participation with a record number of persons at work at 2.8 million people. So our policies are working and our economy is resilient. The latest data to hand show that her labour market was better than many had expected in the latter part of 2025, with the monthly unemployment rate revised downward to 4.7 per cent in December. Other data, such as the CSO information on employee payrolls, show positive momentum at the end of 2025, with employee numbers up 2 per cent. However, I do expect the activity levels will moderate through this year, in part due to international conditions, but also given the labour market is close to full employment. My department is continually monitoring the labour market conditions, and several of our recent initiatives will be centred on supporting the broader economy, not least our ambitions to investment plans in the action plan of competitiveness and productivity that I published last year. The Government remains fully committed to improving our competitive position and adding more jobs in the future, and the action plan has a range of measures to build a more resilient economy. Another important initiative on the labour market front will be the successor strategy to pathways to work 2021-2025, which is overseen by the Department of Social Protection. In fact, the Department has recently concluded a public consultation on this, and the Government looks to develop a new strategy. In respect of high-paid jobs being centred in major urban areas, I think it is important to stress that the Government's commitment to a balanced regional development. Over the past number of years, we have seen strong regional development with incentive employment growth post-pandemic. Since the pandemic, numbers have increased close to a fifth, or 440,000 persons. In fact, Budget 2026 highlighted in particular the spread of employment growth and job gains in every single region, in marked contrast to previous employment expansions. For example, between 2013 and 2019, growth was disproportionately driven by Dublin. The newly released 2024 data from the CSO shows stark disparities in disposable income and worrying employment trends, particularly around the northern and western region. Let me set out some of the figures which are causing concern for me. The average disposable income per person nationally in 2024 was 30,139, but in the northern and western region, it was 27,166. Now, in Mayo, it was 27,343. That was almost 10 per cent below the national average. Now, that is not a marginal gap. I think it is a real clear regional imbalance, and it confirms what communities already know, that workers in the northern and western region are more likely to be in lower-paid employment and have less money left at the end of the month. But even more alarmingly, in 2024, there was 58,140 people recorded as employed in jobs physically located in Mayo. Now, that was a drop of 8.7 per cent on 2023. Thank you, Deputy. Minister. I thank you, Cairlach, and I thank the Deputy again for her response. I would point out that, obviously, the gold standard for us as politicians, and indeed our citizens, is the CSO. It is pointed out that all 13 sectors of the economy is growing equally, that the gross wage of average industrial wage now is over €1,000 per week, which is a 45 per cent increase since 2015. We know in the West we have seen 2,700 new jobs over the last year. That means there are 2,700 families with an additional income going into them this year compared to last year, and it also means that we are working to ensure we have very strong clients based on Budget 2026. Look at Hollister in your own area, look at AbbVie, look at Coca-Cola, Vantiv, Baxter, huge multinational clients providing high-value jobs in the West, and the policies of Budget 2026, particularly our research development and innovation tax credit, will deliver high-quality, high-paid jobs, and that's what this Government is committed to doing. There's something to see here when you look, and I would ask you just to pay attention to these, because what I just quoted you in terms of the drop of 8.7 per cent in 2023 in Mayo alone, that represents 5,540 fewer jobs located in the county in just one year. And yes, some people commute to neighbouring counties, but when the number of jobs physically based in a county falls so sharply, it signals declining regional investment and missed opportunity. Now, while this data does not yet include 2025, it paints a deeply worrying picture of growing regional equality. The statistics don't lie. Based on regional development, balanced regional development cannot just remain a slogan. If high-paid jobs continue to cluster in a small number of urban centres, we'll deepen the housing crisis, pressures in those cities and hollow out rural communities, and widen the income gap between regions. So we need very targeted regional enterprise strategies, and we need stronger incentives for high-value industries to locate to the northern and western region. Thank you. The data which I am quoting is quarter three 2025. So this is the up-to-date data in relation to new high-quality jobs that have been going into the West, as I said, 2,700. If you look at the Midlands, we have 3,900 new jobs, and the South West as well grew by about 4.7 per cent. So all sectors are growing, all component parts that make up our economy are growing, and our wages are growing. And critically, in the CSO annual return in December, their key point was that this is the first time very strongly we have seen real-range growth in our economy. The growth in wages outpoles the rate of inflation, which means people have more purchasing power. And you can see the data very clear for everyone to see. What we want to do is continue on the basis of Budget 2026 to bring more high-quality jobs into rural areas. Our idea strategy is very focused on that 55 per cent going to the regions, and that's going to be key to deliver that over the next five years, and we're very much committed to doing just that.