Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)

I thank the Minister of State very much. Like her, I encourage everybody to get involved in Culture Night. Many of the activities in Culture Night will be led by people who are involved in local community theatre groups and musical societies right around the country. There has been an enormous and very welcome commitment to significant increased funding for the Arts Council, and the introduction of a basic income scheme for artists, as well as a number of measures the Minister of State mentioned, but none of them are of benefit to the amateur musical theatre or amateur drama sector in Ireland.

The Brennan review into the Arts Council is a little bit more about governance. We need to look at the structured funding schemes for the arts in the same way as sport when it comes to building communities. This Government is very clearly doing it for sport but we need to put the arts on a level playing field. There is a very clear commitment in programme for Government to the arts capital programme but the maximum sum in the scheme E capital programme for an arts centre is €50,000, which is minimal for a capital programme when we compare it with the sports capital programme that I also strongly support. I was at a sports club this evening where incredible investment is happening, which is right, but we must do the same with arts venues around the country. We need a dedicated funding stream to support amateur theatre and musical groups because of the number of people involved. The Minister of State knows that people involved in drama groups and musical societies around the country love it and have a passion for it but there are costs involved and we must put a funding stream in place to support them.

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