Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 81: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs the funding for Irish emigrant groups in England providing services for Irish emigrants; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [34675/06]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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The strong commitment of the Government to support the Irish community abroad is reflected in the unprecedented level of funding secured for emigrant services. This year, €12 million is available for that purpose. This figure represents an increase of 45% on 2005 and is 12 times greater than the allocation in 1997 when the Government came to office.

The interests and needs of the Irish community in Britain continue to be a matter of particular importance for the Government. Most of the available funding is directed to organisations there that are engaged in a wide range of community care activities of benefit to Irish people. Increased funding is having a very tangible and positive effect. So far this year, 142 organisations in Britain, of which 129 are located in England, have received grants amounting to €8 million. I am delighted that our support is extending beyond the major cities and is, for the first time, reaching Irish community groups in many towns.

While the primary emphasis of funding continues to be on supporting frontline welfare services, I am pleased that the additional allocation has also made it possible to support a number of capital projects as well as projects that support our community in Britain in its wish to express its Irish identity. Further applications for funding are under consideration and I look forward to making an announcement shortly on additional grants. By the end of this year, I expect that funding to the Irish community in Britain will have reached the unprecedented amount of €9 million, an increase of some 25% on last year's figure.

The funding I have outlined forms an element of a much wider picture of the Government's engagement with our community in Britain. Officials of the embassy and consulates, as well as those in the Irish abroad unit of my Department, will continue to work closely with our community organisations in Britain and elsewhere. In this way, we can ensure that they have a very direct channel to Government and that our response to their needs will be effective in the period ahead.

Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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I appreciate the increase in funding in recent years, but this is only a small amount. What plans are in place to provide additional funding beyond this year? The Minister indicated that he hopes to make further announcements shortly. Is it proposed to provide a substantial increase in funding so that the many groups with which I and others met can ensure that they can properly address the major issues facing Irish emigrants in their 50s, 60s, 70s and even 80s who are living in squalor and who are isolated? Some of these people wish to return to Ireland, while others are seeking an improvement in their quality of life. Are there plans to deliver more packages of the sort that were previously in place in order to encourage or help some Irish emigrants to return home? When I met representatives of the Irish emigrant groups last year, one of the issues put to me was people's desire to return home to the small communities from which they came and perhaps live out the rest of their lives there. These people subsidised the economy when times were hard in this country.

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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As stated earlier, €9 million will be given to community groups in Britain this year. I can safely say that a greater allocation will be made next year in order to honour our commitment to dramatically increase the funding. As already indicated, that funding has increased 12 times since the Government came to office.

It is not often taken into account that when I was Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs, I made changes in respect of pre-1953 contributions. The latter allowed Irish pensioners, not only those in this country but also their counterparts abroad, to gain benefit from stamps they paid prior to 1953. This year alone, €67 million will be paid to 14,000 Irish pensioners under this scheme. The scheme to which I refer has been criticised by the Comptroller and Auditor General since its inception, but I make no apology for it. The pensioners to whom it relates made contributions but did not gain the benefit of them. The vast majority of pensioners who benefit from it are elderly emigrants living in Britain and the €67 million to which I refer will be added to their relatively small British pensions. In my view, that is one of the greatest reasons that the circumstances of Irish people living in Britain have changed dramatically. I accept, however, that difficulties still exist. There has been a dramatic decrease in the number of Irish homeless in Britain, according to a recent report. An official with the Simon Community stated in August that the number of homeless Irish in the six inner-city boroughs had fallen from 600 in 1999 to just 100 this year. He attributed the decrease to the Government's DION projects. He stated that millions of pounds had gone into supporting the Irish to get them off the streets of London and that this has had a very positive impact. He also stated that the Government had done its bit and that the Irish taxpayer had really helped.

Bernard Allen (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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Does the Minister share my disappointment at the fact that proposed legislation in the US to help our emigrants has run into the sand? What is his view of the stalemate that has arisen there due to the impending elections? Does he think the legislation will be resuscitated after the election?

Séamus Pattison (Carlow-Kilkenny, Labour)
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This question refers to the Irish emigrant groups in England. The Deputy's question is separate to that.

Bernard Allen (Cork North Central, Fine Gael)
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I thought my question would be allowed.

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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I am willing to answer it.

Michael D Higgins (Galway West, Labour)
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I welcome the capital projects. Do I take it that the Department has no problem in providing capital funding for shared projects? The groups serving Irish emigrants in Britain realised that the buildings they are replacing will be used by a number of groups. The predominant group may well be Irish so the funding may be in the form of capital partnerships and so on. These partnerships will be multi-ethnic.

I entirely agree with the Minister about the pre-1953 issue. The fact is that 1956 is the year in which most people left Ireland since the Famine — 56,000 people left. A quarter of a million people left between 1955 and 1960, so the 1953 revision helps those people.

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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There are many ethnic groups being dealt with in most of the major Irish emigrant centres. I want the system to be as flexible as possible and I suggested to my officials that as we had built the funding up to a critical mass, we should provide some small capital grants. Emigrant centre officials have told me that if they could inform the local authority in London, Manchester or wherever that they had obtained funding from the Irish Government, the local authorities in the UK would follow on. That has been beneficial.

The situation in the US on the legislation for emigrants is a source of disappointment, but we are keeping a close eye on it. I was in the US recently where I met representatives of the ILIR, the lobby group for Irish emigrants. I also met representatives of emigrant advice centres and we are keeping a close eye on things. The legislation is not dead. The mid-term elections have knocked all legislation off course, including the US-India agreement. We will come back to it, but I do not know whether we will come back to it as before or find another way of doing it.