Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I have a few other specific questions. It is indicated in the Comptroller and Auditor General's report that there was a fine in the year in question of €2.648 million in regard to the transposition and implementation of the directive relating to septic tanks. There was another fine of €1.5 million in regard to the transposition of a directive relating to the environmental impact assessment directive. That sounds as if we were fined for not having it in place, not just for non-implementation but for non-transposition of it.

The Department gets funding of €18 million or €20 million from the national lottery for housing and some of it goes to voluntary housing co-operatives, housing grants, supports for the voluntary sector and other such groups. Of that €20 million the Department receives from national lottery and passes on to the local authorities, can Mr. McCarthy identify the specific houses or projects on which that funding was spent? Is there a mechanism to monitor that, which I suspect there is not, or is such funding simply a general contribution? With sports lottery grants, people can see the completion of a running track, a sports track or a community facility. Such a project is specifically identified and a grant of €100,000, €5,000 or €40,000 is allocated for it, whereas with this funding I get the impression that a social housing programme would have got X amount of it. There seems to be a breakdown in transparency as to where the funds from the national lottery end up in specific projects. The funding seems to go as a subvention to the Department. Would the Department consider having in place a mechanism indicating a breakdown of the funding where it could identify, for example, that a housing scheme got €1 million, a programme for the elderly in a county got €40,000 and the neighbouring county got €28,000? Is it possible to provide a breakdown of that funding?