Mr. Kieran McCarthy:

As Councillor Murphy has noted, we as a delegation and as members of our regional assemblies - I am a member of the southern regional assembly - are fully supportive of the Committee of the Regions's campaign to ensure that regional development funding remains available to all regions in the EU. I will focus particularly on the proposals for the future of European territorial co-operation, ETC, better known as INTERREG. As a key support for European regional development, INTERREG continues to open vast possibilities to forge beneficial links across Europe and allows the free flow of knowledge and experience between regions and cities to the profit of all. For the current funding period INTERREG has been allocated €10.1 billion, distributed across all 28 member states and several non-EU countries. Ireland is involved in nine co-operation programmes, three transnational programmes, three cross-border programmes and two co-operation programmes. INTERREG programmes have directed hundreds of millions of euro to Ireland. In the current period ETC funding has reached approximately €169 million, which is an enormous amount of money. Funds are applied to a huge range of areas, including innovation, entrepreneurship, environment, education, skills, urban regeneration, cultural heritage and rural development. Significantly, INTERREG funds are available to all types of stakeholders, from city councils to community groups, and is one of the most accessible EU funding streams.

The Irish regions have had a key role in terms of INTERREG. Our regional assemblies are contact points, advising on application for ETC funds, and assessing project proposals to ensure high project standards. Additionally, the regional assemblies facilitate access to ETC funds by aligning their regional spatial and economic strategies, RSES, which align to the broader national planning framework which has progressed through Dáil Éireann over the last few months.

The uncertainty around future UK participation in INTERREG threatens to undermine the current range of programmes in which Irish regions and local authorities are involved. This is a major concern as we look to the post-2020 period. We know that it is proposed that PEACE, the Northern Ireland reconciliation programme, will continue as PEACE+, expanding its remit to incorporate some of the Ireland-Northern Ireland-Scotland programme. Beyond this, the questions around the future programmes are more concerning. We do not yet know what impact Brexit will have in our regions. We appreciate the support of the various committees we are involved with in seeking to ensure that Irish regions and local authorities continue to have access to programmes that relate to our geographic and economic priorities.

More broadly, post-Brexit it is imperative that funding be made available so that all county councils and local authorities can recruit and expand EU funding teams. There should be an EU funding officer in every local authority. We have heritage officers and arts officers, so there should be an EU funding officer. It will also be even more important to maximise the potential of the Committee of the Regions, in terms of the opinion documents it produces, to access best practice solutions and increase awareness of the Irish Regions in Europe.

Councillor Freehill will now speak about the outcomes of the recent task force report on subsidiarity.