Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will provide a breakdown of the €30 million of capital funding spent by his Department during December; the reason 18% of his Department’s overall capital spend was held until December; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [5130/13]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The total capital expenditure by my Department in December 2012 amounted to €27.515million which is equivalent to 14% of the total capital budget for the year.

A breakdown of the capital expenditure in December 2012 is as follows:

As indicated in the data, a high proportion of the capital expenditure takes the form of payment of grant aid on projects which have been approved under various grant schemes, e.g. on-farm investment, afforestation, food processing, fishery harbours. Payments are made by the Department as quickly as possible on completion of the projects concerned and submission by the promoters of documented claims. Grant applications and the eventual payments in respect of completed projects are demand led and, accordingly, the pattern of payments over the course of the year is outside of the Department's control.