Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

I do not agree the RAPID programme is a mess. However, I concede that in its initial phase, when groups were asked to draw up plans, the criteria were perhaps not clear enough and the plans were cumbersome and, in certain respects, insufficiently focused. The strand two plans, however, were much more focused on what was achievable.

Consultants have been examining the issue of trying to quantify the scope of measures which were additional to those which would have been introduced in the RAPID areas under the national development plan. This is a challenging task and the Department will examine the issue in the 2007 iteration of the programme.

As the Deputy will be aware, under the original RAPID programme the intention was to match the National Development Plan, 2000 to 2006. As we approach 2007, the review carried out by the Committee of Public Accounts and another review currently under way are proving useful in guiding the Department on what changes should take place.

In the years since I became Minister with responsibility for the RAPID programme, I have made a number of significant changes. For example, I introduced the leverage fund which has had a significant impact on the ground. I incrementally increased the involvement of the local RAPID committees — area implementation teams or AITs — in the process because they were making day-to-day decisions. We also provided that a significant amount of the dormant accounts fund would be ring-fenced for RAPID areas, which recently received an allocation from the fund towards small projects that would otherwise have fallen through the cracks.

The Department has been building incrementally on a good idea, analysing the difficulties encountered in the programme — in this regard the analysis of the Committee of Public Accounts has been useful — and continuously improving the programme. The general feedback I am receiving from RAPID committees, representatives of which I will meet on 1 June, is that they believe the programme has delivered and made an impact in the areas in which it operates. They have also given me ideas on how to improve the programme.

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