Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The national cultural institutions are to undertake a €460 million phased investment programme over ten years, as the Minister has outlined. The plan gives concrete budgets and completion dates for just three of those projects: the Crawford Gallery, the National Library of Ireland and the Natural History Museum. Combined, these projects are to cost €31 million. Rather than giving any detail as to how the remaining €411 million is to be spent on the national cultural institutions we have simply been provided with a list of those institutions. This mirrors the vagueness of the capital investment plan 2016—2021 wherein it was stated “there will also be investment in cultural infrastructure, including the National Cultural Institutions and Regional Arts and Cultural Centres”. Will the Minister outline how exactly she plans on investing in the national cultural institutions?

Many of the projects referred to by the Minister are some of our most important cultural institutions but I urge the Minister to not forget about the regional arts and cultural centres that can be the lifeblood of communities outside the main cities. I hope the focus does not remain on our urban city centres and that the Minister remembers rural Ireland and the more isolated regional arts centres that do phenomenal work in our communities in keeping rural Ireland going.

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