Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I wish to be clear. This was an open, fair and competitive process. It was based on merit of strategy, including the capacity of the LAG, the quality of the strategy and value for money. The West Cork Development Partnership chose to apply independently. It had the opportunity to develop a strategy with the local community development committee, LCDC, and it was aware of the risks in a competitive process. There was no automatic right or entitlement for any organisation to deliver Leader. It was a competitive process.

On EU and Leader funding, a supplementary €3.5 million was provided by the Cork local authority for Cork county and additional funding for rural communities of €1.25 million for west Cork which is welcome. The Commission has not launched an investigation; it has sought additional information, which the Department is providing. A complaint was made on the basis of an issue around state aid but the Department does not consider this to be state aid. There is no economic activity and the local community development committee is only distributing the funds to rural communities, it is not the beneficiary of those funds. I understand there is no formal investigation but information has been requested and the Department is providing it.