Johnny Gogan
Created by info on 16 Apr 2009 | Tagged as: Campaign
Johnny Gogan was previously a candidate in the local elections for Dromahair Ward in 2004 and in 2009.
Founding editor of Film Ireland magazine and of Dromahair’s Adaptation Film Festival he has produced and directed over ten films for cinema and tv. He was appointed as a director of the seven member Irish Film Board in 2008.
He is currently making a film for broadcast later this year about County Leitrim’s dramatic experience of emigration and immigration in its recent history.
A political activist for nearly thirty years Gogan is not new to crisis politics: “I’m in no doubt that the Green Party which I represent are destined for a rough ride in the election followed by a period in Opposition but I’m choosing this election as my first-time candidature for a Dáil seat out of a belief that the issues which first brought me to canvas for the Green Party in 1997 haven’t gone away. In fact the stakes in terms of democracy and environmental protection have been raised.”
Local Democracy and Planning
Since 2004 Johnny Gogan has been involved in a range of innovative activities in Leitrim, including one of the most ground-breaking local actions taken in response to excessive housing development.
“In 2006, in response to Council officials’ Framework Plan for the development of Dromahair - already overdeveloped - I proposed to a group of community activists that we hold a local survey on the Council’s plans, plans which would have seen a further doubling of the population and housing stock.
There was a massive local response. The Council’s plan was re-drafted in response to popular feedback and approved by the County Council. It later formed the basis of challenges made to excessive development in the Dromahair area. In one case - at Killanima near Dromahair in 2007 - I was the sole and successful objector to a sizeable housing development.”
Like the Green Party in Government the local Green Party has been prepared to back right-headed national policies against perceived local interests - such as the eight Centres of Excellence for the treatment of Cancer which has already yielded improved health outcomes regionally and nationally.
Alongwith local colleagues Johnny Gogan stood up to intense local criticism on the issue. “Likewise, I worked with opponents of the runway extension to Sligo Airport by getting the Minister for the Environment to apply the letter of the law in relation to Special Areas of Conservation. In addition to the unacceptable damage envisaged, my belief was that with improved rail and road communications to Sligo already in place and a developing international airport at Ireland West 40mins from Sligo the upgrading of Sligo Airport would have been unsustainable.”
Transportation and Energy Policy
Johnny Gogan believes there needs to a much more coherent transportation policy for the region which ensures public transport options remain or are put in place to service a dispersed population, but one in need of connectivity.
The price of oil is rising worldwide: “the obvious climate change effects of burning fossil-fuels demand that we reduce our car dependence. Our schools - where children are already becoming aware of the need for greater environmental protection - could broaden their ‘Green Schools’ remit to encourage greater car-pooling and optimisation of existing bus transport options.” Gogan also laments the downgrading of Sligo’s Rail Freight service and believes that this should be restored and upgraded.
Energy Policy has enjoyed an acceleration towards renewables in recent years and this Government has overseen expansion of wind energy, invested in wave energy technoligies that could make us exporters of energy in years to come and has provided Grant aid towards Smart metring and a National Home Insulation Scheme which has created much needed jobs and allowed hard-pressed people to cut their home energy bills.
Cultural and Tourism Development
Responding to the lack of a local festival in Dromahair, Johnny Gogan set up Adaptation Film Festival in 2005. This takes place every October. Leitrim and the Region’s first film festival, Adaptation has brought major writers like Edna O’Brien and Roddy Doyle to Leitrim. “I am delighted that this works both as a local event, but that it has attracted a lot of national media attention with the kind of tourism spin-off that we could do with”.
Gogan believes that this region is well placed to benefit from a tourism boost in areas such as hill-walking and cultural tourism. “Alongside the natural beauty of this region, the organisation of a whole range of cultural events (such as Sligo Live) could increase much needed tourism - and employment - in this region.
Enterprise and New Technologies
Johnny Gogan runs his own film production company from Killenummery County Leitrim. He is a great believer in the potential for new technology based enterprises to thrive in a rural environment as the broad-band service improves.
The actions of the Government and its Green Minister Eamon Ryan have significantly improved access to broadband in rural areas. “The range of talent to be found in this region in these years represents an untapped potential for future economic development. In my work as a film-maker and with the Irish Film Board - of which I am the only member not based in Dublin - I am actively involved in developing a regional film production policy which I believe will bear fruit in the years ahead.”
Education and Training.
A recent education survey highlighted the level of truancy at secondary schools in this region. These figures predate any education cut-backs and point to a worrying development in an era where education lies at the heart of personal development and economic advancement. “I would like to see a debate between educators, parents and employers as a means to finding a solution to the problem. This is a complex question and not simply one of resources.” As a parent of young children I welcome last year’s establishment of a universal entitlement to one year’s free Pre-School education for Early Learners.
This is one of the most radical education measures in recent decades benefiting as it does children at the most critical stage in their education”. This proactive measure should be seen alongside the Green Party’s staunch defence of education funding. “Given the scale of budgetary cuts across the Economy this should be seen as a successful rear-guard action, particularly when compared for example with the fate of Education under the UK’s Governing Coalition.
The Future
Johnny Gogan believes that a spirit of innovation is born out of a much more vibrant and active sense of Citizenship than we have practised in recent decades.
“I welcome the ending of this Government and the opportunity for people not just to vote, but to take greater control over their lives and their country. I believe that if we had had a more robust political opposition and civil society - more socially-minded trade unions for example - the sense of political drift and debt-burdening of the population that followed the 2008 Bank bail-out would not have endured the way it has.”
“Yes, the Green Party which I support and am a member of has implemented budgetary policy, but the party has stuck to its guns on a whole range of issues in relation to Financial Regulation, Equity, Social Protection, Planning, Education, Civil Rights and the Environment while also overseeing a much needed overhaul of Public Expenditure. Few in the Opposition had the stomach for this work which is why the election has only now come as a result of the implosion and possibly terminal decline of Fianna Fáil.”
“However I or the Green Party, which evolved from the Green and Ecological movement - outside of Parliamentary Politics - fair in the coming election it is clear that, with the environmental and economic challenges ahead, our own historical project is just beginning.”
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