Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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418. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she has announced the breakdown of funding that will be given to support the various initiatives outlined in the Creative Ireland plan. [11800/17]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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In Budget 2017, I secured funding of €5m to commence the implementation of the Creative Ireland programme which includes delivering ten major initiatives by the end of this year. To date €1m has been allocated to the local authorities towards the implementation of initiatives under Pillar Two of the Creative Ireland Programme including setting up a culture team in each authority, the publication of a Culture and Creativity Plan for each county. A significant allocation will also be made towards the delivery of Cruinniú na Cásca, a programme of arts activities and events on Easter Monday. I will make further announcements on the breakdown in due course. It should be noted that the substantial increases which I obtained for the arts and cultural sector in Budget 2017 will also contribute to the implementation of the Creative Ireland Programme across Government, local authorities and cultural agencies and institutions.

Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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419. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht the amount of funding that will be delivered under pillar 2 of the Creative Ireland plan; and her views on whether this is sufficient. [11801/17]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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The Taoiseach and I launched the Creative Ireland Programme/Clár Éire Ildánach 2017 – 2022 on the 8 December 2016 as the Government Legacy Programme for Ireland 2016 and as the main implementation vehicle for the priorities identified in Culture 2025/ É ire Ildánach, the draft cultural policy which I published in July 2016.This is a cross-Government initiative to mainstream culture and creativity in the life of the nation and to promote individual, community and national wellbeing.

The second pillar of the Programme – Enabling creativity in every community– will be implemented primarily through our local authorities as they are the primary instruments of local community engagement.

Each local authority has now established a Culture Team bringing together arts officers, librarians, heritage officers, museum curators, archivists and other relevant personnel led by a Director of Services, with a nominated person as 'Creative Ireland Co-ordinator'.

A dedicated budget of €1m from the overall Creative Ireland Programme budget of €5m has been allocated to the local authorities towards the implementation of initiatives under Pillar Two including the aforementioned culture teams, the publication of a Culture and Creativity Plan for each county - reflecting at local level the overall structure and aims of the national programme - and the implementation of Cruinniú na Cásca, a programme of arts activities and events on Easter Monday.

I understand that additional support will also be made available to the local authorities for these initiatives by the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government.

This funding is in addition to the other significant additional resources that I secured under Budget 2017 for the arts and culture sector including €5m extra funding for the Arts Council and an additional €1 million to the Heritage Council. I also recently announced details of more than €9 million in capital funding for existing dedicated arts and culture centres across the country.

All of this represents real and substantial funding increases across the arts and cultural area and has been welcomed across the sector. It re-affirms 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.