Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 15 June 2023

Public Accounts Committee

Financial Statements 2021 - Sport Ireland and Sport Ireland Facilities DAC

9:30 am

Photo of Cormac DevlinCormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That is fine. If I could just go back to women in sport, some of the organisations have responded exceptionally well. Some of them were organically on that trajectory themselves. In the club my own children are involved in it is wonderful to see the girls coming through the various levels. In some cases, the girls teams are bigger than the boys teams, which is wonderful to see. Dr. May rightly points out that it is really essential that women are included in the coaching and management structure all the way through, so there is a pathway.

In terms of the funding for disadvantaged and minority communities, I have seen there is more weighting now in grants to ensure that organisations are trying to target and not forget about those areas or sections of society that might, unintentionally, be forgotten about.

I commend Sport Ireland on the work it is doing. The local sports partnerships are a wonderful mechanism because they are very close to the organisations operating within each of the local authorities.

My final point relates to Sport Ireland's facilities, such as the national sports campus and others. I note from the Comptroller and Auditor General's report that a surplus of €29 million was reported. Overall, are the facilities being utilised to the maximum? Are they fully utilised? Infrastructure needs constant investment. Is there a pipeline of investment? I know it is a separate entity, but is there a strong pipeline to ensure there is renovation, repair and maintenance, and potentially expansion of those facilities ongoing?

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