I have made inquiries of the Midland Health Board about this matter and it has been explained to me that the board has no statutory function in the administration of the disabled person's grant. The Government is aware of the importance of this grant in helping to meet the accommodation needs of disabled persons, but the operation of the disabled person's grant scheme at local level is the responsibility of local authorities and one in which neither the Minister for Health and Children nor the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government has any direct function. Authorities operate within a framework laid down in statutory regulations, which is designed to give them an appropriate degree of flexibility in administering the scheme. It is for local authorities to decide the level of funding to be provided for disabled person's and essential repairs grants in their area from within the capital allocation notified to them by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. That Department's involvement in the scheme relates primarily to the recoupment by authorities of two thirds of their expenditure on each grant. The balance of one third of the cost is funded from the authorities' own resources from an amount included for that purpose in their annual estimates.