Ms Emma Murtagh:

I can address the point about what needs to be done to streamline. I do not have the full answer to that question because it seems big and complicated, and there is much going on behind the scenes that I do not necessarily know about. There is much that we can do to lobby at EU level and utilise our MEP presence there to try to simplify those systems, although it seems that the EU is already moving that way, particularly with programmes such as Erasmus+, which has pioneered this lump sum, streamlined system. It seems to be working on that itself. What I see often happen with decentralised funds that are delegated to Irish managing authorities is that there is EU-level bureaucracy and then extra bureaucracy that is inserted over the top of it to safeguard the Irish, because they are the ones who will be audited by Brussels. It seems the risk is being passed on to the applicant to provide extra insulation and more red tape to try to alleviate the risk to the funders themselves.

We can do a review of how we manage decentralised programmes in Ireland and how we can take inspiration from those centralised programmes in Brussels, which have introduced these systems, and how we can try to insulate smaller groups from having to absorb all of the risk by excessive governance and compliance demands. From my point of view, there is a precedent in Brussels. We can replicate it here in Ireland and we can get comfortable with the fact that, in order to be more inclusive, we have to be willing to scale down the burden we are putting on groups that are trying to apply.