Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Something must be going right because I agree with almost everything the Deputy said. I met Jack Marley on half a dozen occasions during the Olympic Games. What a great exemplar of a sport he is in not only qualifying for the Olympic Games - he had to be one of the best in the world to do that - and in the manner in which he took his defeat in the Olympic Games. He is such an honourable gentleman and someone for all of our young people to look up to. I really wanted to say that.

I completely agree with the Deputy that we need to fund more sports facilities. I completely agree that when houses are put in we need more sports facilities and that is why the funding for the community sports facilities fund is now at record levels. It is multiples, approximately five times, what was allocated in 2019. What we have done in terms of having a more broad-based national policy to see where the deficits are, there is now a website, getirelandactive.ie, which lists all the sports facilities. It is a great tool for local people to see what is in their area and what is not, if a person looks up the front page. The back end of the website is a tool for local authorities and for Sport Ireland to get a better picture of what is there and what is not there around the country. For future sports funding programmes it will be a really good tool to look at the deficits. That was put together under the Department this year.

In addition, a number of local authorities are now carrying out sports plans. That is at pilot stage and some of them will be enacted this year. I want all local authorities to pass these plans because, as the Deputy hinted at, the local authorities need to take responsibility to make sure they are providing the facilities and looking to the Department for funding, which we certainly want to be able to provide.

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