Mary Upton (Dublin South Central, Labour)
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Question 340: To ask the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism the number of sports capital grants withdrawn since 2000 due to the sunset rule where clubs are unable to match funding; the number of these clubs that have been based in CLÁR or RAPID areas; if he will provide the information in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28475/08]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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Under the sports capital programme, which is administered by my Department, funding is allocated to sporting and community organisations at local, regional and national level throughout the country. A total of 6,716 projects providing a range of essential sports facilities have now benefited from sports capital funding under the programme since 1998 bringing the total allocation in that time to €675 million.

Under the guidelines, terms and conditions of the sports capital programme, a "sunset clause" provision exists whereby the Department can fully or partially withdraw grants in the absence of satisfactory progress being made by the grantee, for any reason, in drawing down the grant. The reasons for withdrawals vary and in the period from 2001 to 2008, just over €23 million in grants were withdrawn. The information requested in relation to the reasons for projects not proceeding and the proportion of these withdrawals that applied to projects in CLAR or RAPID areas is not readily available and its compilation would involve a disproportionate amount of time and work.

In relation to withdrawals generally, the Department deals with each case on its merits, taking into account the circumstances or difficulties faced by the individual grantee concerned, for example if the project involved is in a highly disadvantaged area. The sports capital programme continues to prioritise the needs of disadvantaged areas in the provision of facilities. Since 2002, those areas that have been designated by Government for special support through the schemes administered by Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, i.e. RAPID, Local Drugs Task Force (LDTF) and CLAR areas, are treated as disadvantaged under the programme.

Projects identified as being located in areas designated as disadvantaged are targeted and prioritised in a number of ways during the assessment of applications. In particular, they are permitted to have a lower level of minimum own funding available towards their project and extra marks are also awarded to such projects during the assessment process by the application of socio-economic disadvantage criterion. Indeed under the 2008 sports capital programme, the level of own funding required by applicants from RAPID and Local Drugs Task Force areas was reduced to 10% from 20%, in line with the commitment in the Programme for Government. I am confident that this measure will further assist projects in disadvantaged areas to benefit from sports capital funding under the programme.