Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy referred to the Leader programme. He raised a point I wished to raise. The Deputy is correct in that the biggest problem we had was that there was a large amount of outstanding money. When I sought funding for the sports capital programme from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, I was asked how I could be allocated money when there was already money outstanding.

I changed the way local authorities did their business. I also introduced a sunset clause, whereby if projects were allocated money the funding stood for two years. If the money was not spent within two years, it was automatically returned to the Department. Previous Ministers kept allocating money, some of which has been outstanding for ten or 12 years because there were no clauses whereby the money could be taken back. I introduced such a clause to the sports capital programme.

The Deputy is correct in what he said about the Leader programme. We will receive funding over the lifetime of the programme because it is a multiannual programme. It is slow to start, as the Deputy knows, because the first two years of the scheme he ran took a long time-----