Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will pass over to my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Joe O'Brien, for some of the queries that have been raised. I will speak about the community centre fund, which I will be announcing very shortly. Community centres and facilities are funded from a number of streams across Government and local government. I am aware there is no dedicated stand-alone funding stream for capital works for community centres. Within the Department, funding streams such as LEADER and the community enhancement programme provide opportunities for community centres to obtain grant funding. They are fairly small grants that are rolled out through the local community development committees, LCDCs.

The pandemic has shown us the need for more investment in community facilities. The Department has secured an additional €5 million for the community enhancement programme subhead. I am looking at using some of the capital carry-forward from 2021 for this purpose also. I do not have a huge amount of money but I will get it started this year. It is a new scheme. It will take some time to finalise it. I hope to make the announcement very shortly. The Deputy can be sure there will be a community centre grant fund. This is important. It will be available throughout the country. Communities have not been able to fundraise and structural defects have appeared in these halls. We need to support them. It is vital that communities have a community centre. I will pass over to the Minister of State, Deputy Joe O'Brien.