Dr. Una May:

One of the most significant investments we have made has been around the development of community sport and physical activity hubs, which have been developed in a number of different areas and across a range of different types of models, specifically targeting disadvantaged areas. We have a few good examples. One in Clonmel taps into work that was already under way, the development of the River Suir and the development of the greenway and blueway. In acknowledging the challenges with the river, flooding issues and all the poor associations with the river, we invested funding through that in the development of a white-water canoeing facility. As part of that, we have developed a community coaching programme, which is a jobseeker's programme, to try to bring people back into the workforce through the medium of sport, where that extra draw is the attraction to the sport bit. We offer them jobseeker's training, CV preparation and that kind of thing. We then offer them coaching programmes as well and we align that with the capital money that is being invested.

In this particular area, the funding was in the area of canoeingcoaching. We also developed an initiative in Croom, County Limerick, putting some capital into the development of a small climbing wall in the community centre. Through community coaching we taught the local community leaders how to teach climbing. Similarly, on a significant housing estate in Gorey, County Wexford, one of the largest estates in the country in a disadvantaged area, we developed a BMX track. We have been trying to target non-traditional sports to try to reach out to people. People know where to go to find their GAA club or soccer club and, therefore, we are trying to target different and less traditional activities.