John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)

The national lottery-funded sports capital programme administered by my Department allocates funding to sporting, voluntary and community organisations at local, regional and national level throughout the country. The programme is advertised on an annual basis. Applications for funding under the 2005 programme were invited through advertisements in the press on 5 and 6 December last and the closing date for their receipt was 4 February 2005.

A total of 1,362 applications were received before the deadline, including one from the organisation in question, all of which are being evaluated against the programme's assessment criteria. The criteria are outlined in the guidelines, terms and conditions of the programme. I intend to announce grant allocations under the programme as soon as possible after the assessment process has been completed.

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