Jimmy Deenihan (Kerry North-West Limerick, Fine Gael)

The Deputy makes a practical proposal. In the past year, I have met local authority arts and heritage officers who play a critical role in promoting the arts across the country. The Arts Council is a national organisation based in Dublin, whereas local authority arts officers do most of the work promoting the arts in small communities. I envisage an important role for arts officers in the new programme because they have already reached out and established a large number of twinning arrangements. Some towns are twinned with up to six partners around Europe. Given the connections that have been made under the twin towns arrangements, it may be possible to use them as a vehicle for capitalising on the programme. A great deal of work remains to be done.

As I stated, our approach to this programme in the past was not sufficiently serious, primarily because the process was complicated. Necessity means we must go through the process. I thank Deputy O'Donovan for his proposal. With Limerick set to become a city of culture in 2014, perhaps he will encourage arts organisations in the city and county to consider using the programme to maximise the amount of financial assistance available to Limerick for its 2014 programme.

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