Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)

Dublin hosted the first culture night in 2006. On culture night key artistic and cultural venues extend their opening hours until late in the evening, providing the public with increased access. Since then the Department's focus has been to develop the event, in conjunction with the Temple Bar cultural trust, which co-ordinates the event by encouraging more venues to participate and to remain open later in the evening. The trust met representatives from the cultural community in Belfast with a view to launching a North-South culture night project for 2009. In addition, following a request from the Department, the trust investigated the possible extension of the culture night concept to areas outside Dublin.

An important element for the success of the culture night concept is the concentration of cultural organisations in an area able to offer a range of cultural activities. Taking into account the findings received from the Temple Bar cultural trust, the Department offered assistance to the city managers of Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford in the promotion of culture night in these cities. I am pleased to say that all four cities participated in culture night on Friday, 19 September 2008. The Department also wrote to the County and City Managers Association highlighting the high level of participation in Dublin's culture night and how successful the event is in building and sustaining a strategy for cultural tourism.

Over 80 arts and cultural organisations participated in the Dublin event in 2008, including the national cultural institutions. It is estimated that 100,000 people took part, many of whom would have been visiting Dublin's cultural organisations for the first time. The cities of Limerick, Galway, Cork and Waterford also programmed approximately 50 events on the night.

Culture night promotes access to and participation in the cultural life of each city. A key factor in its success to date is the partnering of the cultural community with the business community, and the active participation of the tourism and transportation bodies. It is modelled on similar successful events in other European cities, which concentrate on providing cultural and artistic events on one evening, in some cases round the clock, rather than over a weekend.

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