Niall Collins (Limerick County, Fianna Fail)
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202. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht to outline the progress under the programme for Government on introducing a Sparkasse model for small and medium-sized enterprises lending. [38271/16]

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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The Programme for a Partnership Government contains a commitment to investigate, amongst other options, the German Sparkassen model for the development of local public banks that operate within well-defined regions. The role of my Department in relation to this commitment is to work with other Departments and stakeholders to examine the feasibility of the model.

Senior officials from my Department recently met with their counterparts in the Department of Finance and have agreed to develop a work programme to examine the potential of the Sparkassen model and other models of local public banking, as referenced in the Programme for a Partnership Government.

The officials group will meet again in January and hope to be in a position to conclude their work around the middle of next year. As part of their work, the officials group will engage with relevant stakeholders as required.