Mr. Joe Hamill:

For several years from the capital funding side, the Department has been investing in arts facilities. However, responsibility for the running of centres falls to the Arts Council, local authorities and so forth. The Department is not directly involved.

We have done some work in supporting philanthropy in this area. Several arts organisations have engaged in philanthropic fund-raising for arts centres, funding we have matched. In the past three or four years these schemes have been quite successful, with funding, although limited, amounting to €1 million each year.