Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

My Department supports volunteer centres, community and voluntary fora in every county, local authorities, the community sector and the bottom-up approach associated with the European funding we receive under the rural development programme. We also have in place the local community development programme. There is, therefore, a large degree of support in place for communities. As the Deputy correctly pointed out, if we did not have these programmes, Mayo Abbey and many similar bodies in other areas would not be as strong as they are. We are not asking local authorities to get involved in the Mayo Abbeys of this world but to streamline existing structures to allow scarce resources to be deployed to assist Mayo Abbey and similar organisations with their current expenditure costs, for example, by providing a new minibus for community activities. This is to ensure funding is not tied up in administration. There are sufficient administrative structures in place in the local government system under current budgets to deal successfully with the programmes that are on offer.

It is possible that funding for the new rural development programme will be only half what was made available under the previous six year programme. Surely the Deputy is not advocating providing the same level of administrative support to deliver a programme that will be less than half the size of the current programme. I can understand the reason community groups are worried about this issue. They became accustomed to a particular structure and support base when times were good. The big issue is to ensure a high level of participation on the ground rather than in offices, and that will be our focus. We intend to streamline this process to avoid duplication.

We must also have an accountable structure in place for the European Commission. We do not have clear blue water on such issues, as the Deputy will be aware from her own area, and we are trying to solve them. Unfortunately, this has been going on for too long. We are trying to find a way to enable north-east County Mayo to apply successfully through the system before the end of this year. We are working with the community to try to achieve this objective.

The number of local government staff nationally has declined by 9,000, yet we expect local authorities to deliver the same level of service. They will not be able to do this without the support of the community sector. It is in our interests to ensure synergies between the community and local government sectors. This must be done in a democratic and co-ordinated manner rather than in the disjointed way we have at present.