Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)

I thank the Minister for that detailed explanation of how the money is distributed. My key point was that a very modest amount of money was set aside for disadvantaged areas. In 2007 that was €2 million and in 2008 it has been cut back to €1.5 million. All the other moneys are available and under the sports capital programme they have always been there. This is additional money dedicated, I thought, to disadvantaged areas for minor or smaller projects. My concern is that those small projects may lose out because of the money being depleted. There is a cutback of €500,000 and in real terms it is more than that, given that there was a reduction from €2 million in 2007 to €1.5 million in 2008. It is a modest amount of money but I wonder why the tranche of money dedicated to disadvantaged areas was reduced.

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