John Cummins (Waterford, Fine Gael)

The information I have is that Cavan County Council has drawn down €1.5 million of its €1.86 million allocation and, with that 15% local authority contribution, it has resources of €2.19 million to spend this year. Our Department works closely with every local authority to maximise drawdown under the scheme. That does mean any underspends that arise in other local authorities can be redistributed to local authorities that have high levels of grant activity in an effort to redistribute them. Given the benefits of the schemes, which I see in my county of Waterford in terms of drawdown, and the difference they make to communities, families and individuals on the ground, we want to see a maximum drawdown of allocations. We will continue to work with local authorities in respect of their allocations.