Mr. Paul McDermott:

Of the €70 million, there is a specific strand involving €15 million for clubs, to be allocated through the governing bodies and so on, but we also encouraged the local sports partnerships to run grant schemes locally.

They may have access to smaller clubs or community groups that would not necessarily have a strong relationship with national bodies. There was very strong take-up of that scheme as well. That would be covered. I want to give people confidence that every effort is being made to get right into communities and into every strand of Irish sport through governing bodies and local sports partnerships. Every effort was made to make sure that all clubs, large or small, knew there was a scheme available to them. We are encouraged by signs from the sports partnerships that there has been strong pick-up and good coverage. It will take a few weeks to validate all of the applications but in reviewing the information we have got in the last few days we have seen that both governing bodies and sports partnerships have done a good job in connecting with their club networks to ensure applications are forthcoming.