Joe McHugh (Fine Gael)

I move amendment No. 1:

In page 4, to delete lines 32 to 39, to delete pages 5 to 9 inclusive and in page 10, to delete lines 1 to 9.

I welcome the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Deputy Ó Cuív. He had a close call and I am glad he is recovering and before the Upper House again.

The Committee Stage debate on this Bill was truncated and too emotional at times and I wish to re-focus it on the Fine Gael Party's position on dormant accounts. Value for money is a major issue in terms of applications for funding made by community groups and how such funding is then spent. There is a problem with regard to the mainstream allocation of funding to groups which need it. It applies both to dormant accounts funds and lotto funding. While funding is useful to disadvantaged groups and community groups seeking money for capital purposes, stop-gap capital for human resources may not be sufficient when allocated once or twice. In the long term, we must focus our capacity on a national basis. To give credit where it is due, the Minister tried to do this and acknowledged the extent of duplication among State agencies.

Greater value for money would be obtained in the allocation of funding if much of the work was carried out more thoroughly. No mechanism is in place to track the funds allocated, monitor the way in which they are allocated or the areas which receive them. It is fine to hand a group €100,000 or €200,000 as a stop-gap measure but where are the follow-up and tracking measures? These are necessary if we are to get to grips with involving community groups and empowering them in the decision-making process.

The Fine Gael Party's main difficulty with the dormant accounts funds is that the initial structure of the dormant accounts disbursements fund ensured decisions would be taken at the level of partnership groups, specifically Area Development Management Limited. My party opposes decisions on the disbursement of funds being taken by the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. This issue formed the basis of the debate on Committee Stage, during which Senators only scratched the surface. There is a deep malaise with regard to enterprise boards, community development groups, county development boards, partnership boards and cross-Border institutions. There are so many difficulties regarding where the groups are going, how they are funded and value for money when funding is allocated. We can be political and accuse Fianna Fáil of wanting the money for a pre-election slush fund. However, that is a minor part of the debate. If the shoe was on the other foot and Fine Gael was in power, we would probably do the same.

The Minister has tried to address the malaise. He has been to Donegal, which has the Inishowen Partnership, Donegal Local Development Company, Údarás na Gaeltachta and enterprise and county development boards. This plethora of representative organisations are trying to do the same thing at community level. On an economic level, there is the Western Development Commission, the Border midlands and western region, along with numerous cross-Border groups. These organisations all try to do good work. However, we have a centralised type of government. We must start at the beginning and empower these groups. I am not merely talking about development and community and economic representative groups, but also FÁS and the Department of Social and Family Affairs. There must be a decentralisation of power. Those in charge of regional groups must be given more power. There should be a national strategy for a country such as Ireland, which is unique and diverse in every region. That is the problem we have today.

What has this to do with amendment No. 1? We are only scratching at the surface of the issue of dormant accounts. We are playing petty politics over an issue which is far greater than the dispersal of funds. The manner in which the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs will take charge of the dispersal of funds is not the way forward. However, perhaps the Minister thinks it is the only way because there are so many groups and representative organisations. We must target and tackle the issue of how and where we spend our money, and ensure for the first time that taxpayers are confident their money will be distributed throughout the country. I am putting forward a general argument. It is a pity the Leader is not here because a wider debate is needed.