John O'Donoghue (Kerry South, Fianna Fail)

I agree with the Deputy that facilities are still required in many parishes across the country. That is why we are continuing with the sports capital programme as aggressively as possible. The reason the audit is taking such a time is the amount of work involved. All the facilities across the country have to be included in the audit. They include not just key national facilities but, for example, GAA grounds, rugby and soccer grounds, university sports campuses, local authority sport centres, synthetic athletic tracks and swimming pools, as well as facilities in primary and post-primary schools. In addition there are the facilities which have benefited under the sports capital programme. One has to identify as well facilities provided by voluntary organisations as well as those available in the community generally which might have received grant assistance from other Departments.

We are conducting the audit in two phases and trying to complete it as quickly as we can while obtaining as much information as possible on key national and regional facilities. I have indicated to Deputy Wall in reply to an earlier question on the London Olympics in 2012 that we are dealing with that separately and distinctly.

See this speech in context