Firstly I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who came out and voted for me in the local elections, while my overall vote was down on 2014 and 2019, I am still truly humbled that over 900 people gave me your Number One vote. Serving my local community as an elected member on Fingal County Council for the past ten years has been the honour of my life.

As always I really appreciate all the messages of support over the last few weeks, and, even more, so the many, many kind messages since the result and losing of my seat on Fingal County Council. I know from the messages, so many of you appreciate the work that I have carried out in our area both before my time as a County Councillor and since my first election in 2014. Although I have not secured a seat this term, I know I have given my all, gained a huge amount of experience and I have really enjoyed the honour and privilege of being your Councillor for the last ten years. While making progress on so many matters can be frustratingly slow, I am proud of advancing so many projects and indeed look forward to seeing many of the projects I have been working on in more recent months and years as they continue to filter through. This year 2024 saw the 3 year Fingal County Council Capital programme of works adopted and contained within that plan are a number of multi-million Euro projects specifically for Donabate Portrane that I worked on very hard over the last 10 years to get into the plan.

When first elected in 2014 the local and central government investment into the Donabate Portrane peninsula was paltry, however I take real pride in more recent years that this investment has risen well into the millions and I earnestly hope this level of deserved investment into our local community will continue into the future.

For me, some of my own personal highlights over the 10 years include seeing the return of the Blue Flag and Green Coast award to Balcarrick beach, Donabate, the opening of the Donabate Distributor Road, the establishment of the Fingal Coastal Liaison Committee,the first of its kind in the country to address coastal erosion and the success of both the Flavours of Fingal and our own local Donabate Portrane Summer Festival are real highlights, that I fought and worked hard on and was glad to see make real and substantial progress over my 10 years.

Going forward, I also am well aware from the years of preparatory work of so many new and upcoming projects including the Broadmeadow Greenway connecting Donabate to Malahide,the upgrade of the Hearse Road, Donabate from the Lissenhall Interchange, ongoing major investment and improvements at Newbridge House and Park and the delivery of the world class Sporting and Recreational Campus at Ballymastone which I have worked so closely on with our 3 local anchor clubs, St. Pats GAA, St. Ita’s AFC and LSA Athletics club since 2014. A segregated Greenway connecting Portrane Village to Donabate village should also be delivered by the Council’s Active Travel team. A new Library including a major expansion at Ballisk House Donabate is also imminent which will also allow for significant additional space at our fantastic local Donabate Portrane Community Centre. While I absolutely would have preferred quicker progress on these projects, it is still reassuring to know these projects have certainty of delivery and will be delivered for Donabate in the upcoming years.

I am also proud to have worked on increasing permeability and accessibility throughout Donabate, with two new pedestrian entrances to Newbridge House and Farm, the improved footpath works at Turvey Avenue, the recently introduced increasing hours of opening at Ballisk Gate and the vastly new upgraded footpaths at Corballis with further improvements to come. Without doubt the project I worked hardest on in collaboration with both Scoil Phadraic Cailini, St. Patrick’s Boys National School, local residents and businesses is the long overdue proposed new footpaths and safety improvements on the approaches to both schools along the Portrane Road. Progress has been painfully slow but I have carefully monitored this and the coming months should finally see these works get underway. My thanks to both Schools especially Ms. Greene and Mr. Horan for their perseverance and patience in awaiting these much needed infrastructural improvements. My gratitude to local residents also for your cooperation and understanding.

As a public representative, I worked extremely hard to build relationships and alliances across the County, to represent and fight hard on so many issues on behalf of my local community and to build proper plan-led frameworks such as the Fingal County Development Plan, the Donabate Local Area Plan and the recently adopted following many years of work and consultation, Donabate Urban Framework Plan which are now in place to ensure the ongoing phased and sustainable development of Donabate. For me, it is essential that these Plans acknowledge the unique contribution the Peninsula makes to the wider Fingal area and that all future development on Donabate Portrane greatly adds to our beautiful peninsula while taking nothing away. I am very proud to now have these plans and frameworks in place to underpin future development across Donabate and Portrane.

I also want to take this opportunity to sincerely thank my family, friends and team, my supporters, and the Fianna Fáil Party members who spared no effort, and left no stone unturned in my re-election bid, and ran a really positive campaign. While losing my seat is very disappointing on a personal level, I fully respect it as a strong supporter of democracy and local government. Donabate Portrane is an incredible place, full of incredible people and has an incredibly bright future.

Fingal County Council faces a challenging five years balancing the need for growth alongside the social, environmental and climate issues that exist. I wish our incoming elected members, Cllr. Boland, Cllr. Dockrell, Cllr. Johnston, Cllr. Mulville and Cllr. O Donoghue every success and goodwill during their term. I hope that they can work constructively together to ensure that Donabate Portrane remains an incredible place to live and secure the delivery of the new levels of physical and social infrastructure that will be needed in tandem with the new housing and developments that are on the way.