Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 175: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the amount of money returned to the European globalisation fund from the funds secured for Dell workers in Limerick as contained in his report to the European Commission of 28 December 2011 on the EGF Dell programme.; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41183/11]

Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 234: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will publish the European globalisation fund final report and statement of expenditure that was submitted to the European Commission on 28 December 2011; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1031/12]

Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 175 and 234 together.

My Department as the EGF Managing Authority in relation to the Dell EGF Programme, submitted the Final Report and accompanying statement of expenditure to the European Commission on 23 December 2011 as required in compliance with the EGF Regulations and the specific European Commission decision awarding a financial contribution from the EGF to finance active labour market measures following the redundancies in Dell and its suppliers in Ireland. The total certified expenditure representing the contributions of the EGF and national funding included in the statement was Euros 13,619,598 in relation to measures carried out after 3 February 2009 and before 29 June 2011.

Until the European Commission has duly considered these documents and responded formally to the Department, no monies have been, or will be, returned from those received in respect of this EGF programme. Under Article 15.2 of the EGF Regulations, the European Commission shall wind up the financial contribution from the EGF no later than six months after it has received all the information required in relation to the final report and statement of expenditure. Similarly, as the final report and statement of expenditure submitted to the European Commission are the subject of ongoing discussions between the parties, I will not be in a position to make them available until that process is complete.

The Department circulated an EGF review consultation document to relevant worker representative bodies and to service providers on 22 December 2011. This review exercise should be very useful to my Department in delivering on future EGF programmes in Ireland.