Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)

That is a very short answer. I have been raising this with the Minister for a while. The previous Minister asked me to find savings for the Department. This Minister announced the Leader programmes. A number of Leader programmes all over the country have not made applications for the programmes and the Minister has amalgamated a number of groups. There is great concern about this issue. There were four Leader programmes in my county and the Minister has reduced that to two. One did not even apply and the other is in discussions and is part of the process.

What has the Minister done about the State funding put into these Leader programmes? Will these assets return to the Minister, Department and the people of the country, or will they stay with the people who established companies? There is outrage about this issue. What is the amount of assets involved? Which groups have not given the Minister the assets for which the State provided the money? This is a very serious situation. If taxpayers' and European money is given to Leader groups which have property all over the country, and if these groups are no longer taking part in the Leader programme, are those assets returning to the State? What has the Minister done about the new Leader programme to protect us and ensure that this does not happen again?

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