Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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395. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the way she plans to ensure arts funding is used to ensure minority and new Irish voices are heard as part of cultural output. [11685/17]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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402. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she will work with the Minister for Health to develop and roll out an arts and health strategy across acute and children’s hospitals and across the community health sector; and the other innovative approaches being considered to use the arts as a means to promote wellbeing across society. [11694/17]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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403. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the action she is taking with her Government colleagues to systematically address social, geographic and economic barriers to full participation in the artistic and cultural life of the country, particularly for children and young persons. [11695/17]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 395, 402 and 403 together.

Under the Arts Act 2003, primary responsibility for the promotion and support of the arts, including inclusivity in the arts, throughout the country is devolved to the Arts Council. In Budget 2017, I secured significant additional funding for the Arts Council. This will see an increase in the Arts Council allocation in 2017 of €5m, or 8%, and will assist the Council in implementing its 10-year strategy Making Great Art Work (2016-2025). This strategy places specific emphasis on the need to plan and provide for children and young people. The 5 high-level values of the strategy include a commitment to excellence, as well as respect for diversity of artistic practice, of public engagement, and of social and cultural traditions. The strategy also commits to working to achieve full implementation of the Arts in Education Charter. The Strategy is available on the website of the Arts Council.

The Creative Ireland Programme is the Government’s Legacy Programme for Ireland 2016 and the main implementation vehicle for the priorities identified in Culture 2025/Éíre Ildánach the draft framework policy which I published in July of last year. It is a five-year all-of-government initiative, from 2017 to 2022, which places creativity at the centre of public policy.

The Programme is built around five pillars one of which is Enabling Creativity in Every Community. The Centenary Programme demonstrated two critically important aspects of local governance: first, local authorities are the primary instruments of community engagement and second, local authorities have a particular capacity for local programme delivery, especially in the context of citizen engagement. Further details of the Creative Ireland Programme can be accessed at the following link

In addition to the Creative Ireland Programme, I recently launched the Action Plan for Rural Development which is the first whole-of-government strategy aimed at people living and working in rural Ireland. It aims to unlock the potential of rural Ireland through a framework of supports at national and local level which will ensure that people who live in rural areas have increased opportunities for employment locally, and access to public services and social networks that support a high quality of life. The Plan contains 276 actions which aim to improve both the economic and social fabric of rural Ireland spread across five pillars.

The fourth pillar of the Action Plan is Fostering Culture and Creativity in Rural Communities.

The key objectives of this Pillar are to:-

- Increase access to the arts and enhance cultural facilities in rural communities ;

- Further develop and enhance culture and creativity in rural Ireland through the establishment of culture teams and creativity hubs as part of the Creative Ireland Programme;

- Promote the Irish language as a key resource in Gaeltacht and other rural communities.

These objectives will be delivered as part of the work programme across my Department, and in particular as part of the Creative Ireland Programme which was launched by the Taoiseach and I on 8th December last. All of these initiatives by my Department and its agencies will seek to address the issues set out in the questions.