Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail)
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19. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if he is satisfied that his Department’s current strategy relating to philanthropy here will result in a rise of donations to philanthropic causes in the coming years; the actions he will take in 2014 to ensure a strong philanthropic community here; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [51456/13]

Jimmy Deenihan (Kerry North-West Limerick, Fine Gael)
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My colleague, Mr Phil Hogan, T.D., Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, has responsibility for philanthropy in general and for increasing donations to philanthropic causes. The Deputy can access the recommendations of the report of the Forum on Philanthropy and Fund-raising and associated updates at: .

I am however, pleased to avail of the opportunity to give the House information on some initiatives in the area of Philanthropy and the Arts. The Programme for Government includes the following commitment:

"We will work with stakeholders in the Arts community to develop new proposals aimed at building private support of the Arts in Ireland exploring philanthropic, sponsorship or endowment fund opportunities".

Since taking office, I have introduced a number of initiatives to address this commitment. In May 2012, I introduced a new philanthropic initiative for arts and culture organisations. The initiative - the Philanthropic Leverage Initiative - was designed to encourage philanthropic sponsorship and endowment of the arts from private sources. The initiative has provided an incentive to arts organisations to proactively seek new funding relationships with sponsors, which deliver private sector financial support, thereby increasing overall funding available to the arts. The initiative proved very successful with a multiplier of 4.26 in philanthropic donations being leveraged – giving the arts a boost of over €1 million last year, of which less than one-fifth came from the public purse. A full list of awards under this scheme can be viewed on my Department's website at . This year, funding of up to €210,000 has been available to arts organisations under the Initiative.

In October 2012, I hosted and chaired a forum on Philanthropy and the Arts in Smock Alley Theatre. It featured speakers from key philanthropic organisations and the arts in Ireland. The conference was very well attended and generated very positive feedback. There is a full report of the conference on my Department's website.

Parallel to these initiatives, following my policy initiative, the Arts Council is continuing with another initiative entitled RAISE: Building Fundraising Capacity - which dovetails with the work in my Department. The initiative consists of a programme, which is providing one-to-one professional support to selected arts organisations for two years to assist in planning and implementing a tailored fundraising programme for each organisation. Eight leading Irish arts organisations are aiming to raise €10 million in private funding over the next five years as part of this Arts Council initiative.

My Department has also provided support to Business to Arts (a not-for-profit organisation working to support resilience and transformation in the cultural sector through research, innovation and partnership) for a number of years and, in each of the last three years, this has been allocated to delivery of the New Stream Programme, which builds fundraising skills in the cultural sector in Ireland.

I can assure the Deputy that I will be continuing to avail of every opportunity to promote philanthropy in order to complement Government funding of the arts and to encourage more arts organisations to engage with business to their mutual benefit.