John Deasy (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Question 576: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the expenditure by her Department on providing services through the Irish language in each of the years 2002, 2003 and 2004; and the breakdown of the expenditure under training, translation, advertising, bilingual signage and other. [32479/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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My Department has always been conscious of its remit to actively support the Irish language. We have a customer base that expects a service through Irish and we provide for Irish versions of application forms, information leaflets and reports. During 2002 to 2004, my Department spent in excess of €300,000 on providing services to our Irish-speaking customers.

Training costs incurred for departmental staff between 2002 and 2004 were as follows: 2002 —€4,055.37; 2003 —€18,938.55; 2004 —€17,201.30. These figures relate to administration costs only and do not include expenditure on the education system itself.

Translation costs between 2002 and 2004 were: 2002 —€47,117.54; 2003 —€40,727.64; 2004 —€71,225.13. These figures relate to the Department only. A total of €108,758.22 was spent on advertising. The breakdown is as follows: 2002 —€65,126.03; 2003 —€33,374.63; 2004 —€10,257.56. Signage costs were incurred only in 2003 when €306.46 was spent on bilingual signage.