Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

45. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the amount of funding awarded to the arts, excluding commemoration specific pieces of work, since 2011; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [13256/16]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Details of the funding allocations made available to my Department are published each year in the Revised Estimates Volume with the outturn published in the annual Appropriation Account. These publications are available on the website of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and on the website of the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General.

Most of my Department's arts and culture budget is allocated to the agencies under its remit. Within these allocations, the Arts Council is the primary State agency for funding the arts in Ireland. In 2016, I provided €60.1m to the Arts Council, an increase of over 7.5% since 2014. This does not include any specific funding for commemorations.

Details of the Arts Council's expenditure including its individual grants are published on the Arts Council's website at www.artscouncil.ie.

Where my Department makes direct grants to organisations, the figures are published on the website of my Department at www.ahg.gov.ie. The figures for 2016 will be published in due course.

It should be noted that the support provided directly by my Department for the arts primarily relates to capital investment in arts infrastructure. In this regard, I announced a new €9 million investment scheme for arts and cultural centres to run over the next three years focussed on upgrading the existing stock of arts and cultural centres around the country.

My Department is finalising the guidelines and application forms in relation to the scheme which I intend to open for applications very shortly.