Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The community enhancement programme and community services programme come from current expenditure and the spend will be drawn down. The Senator made an observation that I made after being Minister for only a short time. He is correct that some organisations have professionals who can put in applications on their behalf but others, which do professional work, do not have the same support so do not get the funding they should. In response to this, I asked my officials to go around the country to Helping Hands events, which were designed to help and support organisations in filling in applications. I could name six or seven groups in every county that come in on every single scheme and draw down from every pot but I could also name groups in west Mayo, north Mayo, north Kerry or north Sligo that did not get the opportunity, even though they are doing more valuable work than some of the others that are good at putting in the applications. We are working on it and I compliment my officials on meeting organisations around the country, for which the latter were grateful. A lot of groups do not know what funding is available so the Helping Hands events were very good for them.

The current funding will be drawn down and nothing will be left. In fact, we are looking for more in respect of both programmes. I can be critical of local authorities but I must be fair to them as well. For a good few years during the recession, there were no schemes and local authorities did not realise there would be continuation when the new Department was set up. I met county managers, outlined the expenditure over the next number of years and told them about the schemes so most local authorities make better applications now. One of the unfair criticisms the Department gets all the time, which also happens in respect of the LEADER programme and local authorities, relates to capital works funding. Some of these schemes take between 12 and 15 months to build. I could have been stricter than I previously was with regard to planning but, from now, I am not allowing further rural regeneration scheme applications unless they have full planning. There is no point giving funding to an organisation only for it to find that it has been refused planning permission or there is an objection and, two years later, they cannot spend the money. I am being stricter in allocating money now but there is a big improvement in spend.

Deputy Cowen was derogatory about the Department in his speech on the budget but his own county received €16 million, €2 million of which has not been drawn down. He would be better off asking his local authority why it did not spend that allocation. The investment the county got was very welcome, nonetheless, as it is in every county. This Department is working well, though, like every Department, it takes a while to bed down. What has happened in the Department in the past two years, however, has been exceptional. It has worked under difficult conditions and while every other Minister had a Secretary General in an established Department to meet, we did not even have an office. We were expected to function and we did that. It is a fantastic Department with a fantastic team and fantastic commitment. Whoever is in government next, the Department has to be left in place because people are happy with its expenditure and with what is happening. They want the Department and its funding to continue.