Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

I have raised this issue before as have many others and I do not wish to labour the point. The Arts Council cannot plan if it does not have multi-annual funding. If the Arts Council cannot make plans then the groups it funds cannot make plans. The Minister and everybody else will know that any business unable to make plans will be inefficient. The money which the Minister gives the Arts Council will be partly wasted as a result and the outcomes will not be optimum because the money is not being expended efficiently. We all know this is the case. The Fianna Fáil manifesto said it and the programme for Government acknowledged the need for annual funding. Did the Minister make any pitch for multi-annual funding to the Minister for Finance? Such funding would be a more sensible approach. The Government acknowledges the need for efficiency in other areas such as in the roads programme where there is multi-annual funding. I am not asking for more money but rather a sensible way of allocating money so the groups funded through the Arts Council can have some ability to make forward plans.

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