Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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170. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she has agreed to carry over funding for the 1916 commemoration to the general arts, culture and film programme for 2017; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31285/16]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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171. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if the Government will commit to the long-term goal of increasing arts funding to the European average of 0.6% of GDP. [31286/16]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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172. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht her plans to increase funding for the arts over the lifetime of the Government; and her views on whether funding for the Arts Council and the Irish Film Board should be doubled. [31287/16]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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212. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht her views on the 16% reduction in the 2017 Estimates for the arts, education and film programme compared with the 2016 Estimates; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31452/16]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 170 to 172, inclusive, and 212 together.

I have retained the majority of the €18 million current funding which was provided for the 2016 Commemorations for reallocation to arts and cultural purposes within my Department's Vote. It will, therefore, become part of the baseline figures for my Department, meaning that it will carried forward into future years.

Budget 2017 provides for:

-an additional €5 million for the Arts Council, an 8% increase in its annual budget;

- increased funding for all of the National Cultural Institutions;

- an increase of €2 million for the Irish Film Board and €1 million for Culture Ireland; and

- an additional €1 million to the Heritage Council.

I have also secured a new funding stream of €5m for the implementation of a Culture 2025/Ireland 2016 Legacy Programme, which will allow me to build on the positive legacy of the Ireland 2016 commemorations. I will be announcing details of this new initiative shortly.

All of this represents real and substantial funding increases across the arts and cultural area and has been welcomed across the sector. It also reaffirms the commitment of this Government to progressively increase funding for the arts as the economy improves, as set out in the Programme for a Partnership Government.

It should be noted that the majority of the €49 million allocation to my Department for this year's Ireland 2016 Centenary Programme was capital funding that went towards a series of 'Permanent Reminder' projects, including the new 'Witness History' visitor centre at the GPO, the refurbishment of Richmond Barracks, the Kevin Barry Rooms at the National Concert Hall and the Athenaeum in Wexford. With the completion of the various 'Permanent Reminder' projects, the capital funding provided for them will not be required in 2017. The projects themselves will, of course, continue to be a positive and lasting legacy for the people of Ireland.

I understand that the source of the reference to 0.6% of GDP quoted by the Deputy is a Council of Europe research project and that m any European countries, including ten EU member states, are not included in the data. I understand also that the data is not standardised and is not comparable across countries. For example, local authority expenditure on the arts, the artists ' exemption tax relief, expenditure on public service broadcasting and the Irish language are not included in the figures for Ireland but comparable figures are included in the data for some other countries.

I have previously stated that further research on this issue is warranted and my Department is considering the matter at present. The issue of a definition of culture and of capturing public expenditure on culture is an element of the draft Culture 2025framework policy, which was forwarded to the Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs for input in July last.

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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173. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she will create an arts capital fund, modelled after the sports capital fund, to ensure better long-term funding for the Irish arts. [31288/16]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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Earlier this year, I announced a new €9 million investment scheme for arts and cultural centres to run over the next three years, focussed on enhancing the existing stock of such centres around the country. The funding is being made available as part of the Capital Investment Framework 2016-2021.

My Department's scheme targets investment at a range of different facilities and will be broken down into three streams as follows:

- The refurbishment and enhancement of existing purpose-built arts and cultural facilities, with maximum grants of €300,000. Eligible facilities would include arts centres, theatres, galleries, museums, artists' studios and creative spaces (Stream 1).

- Significant improvements to a smaller number of key facilities. Ideally, projects seeking this stream of funding would have financial support from the relevant local authority. Grants of up to €2 million may be offered under this stream (Stream 2).

- Smaller grants of up to €20,000 for community or voluntary organisations operating in facilities, which have not been purpose-built (Stream 3). The details of this Stream are being finalised and will open for applications shortly.

It is my priority to target investment at securing and enhancing existing cultural facilities.

The closing date for receipt of applications under Streams 1 and 2 was 16th September. Applications received by my Department for funding under this scheme are now undergoing evaluation.