Noel Rock (Dublin North West, Fine Gael)
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53. To ask the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht her plans to use the medium of the arts to project a positive national image, promote tourism and generate renewed economic activity; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [11752/17]

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. This is a cross-Government initiative to mainstream culture and creativity in the life of the nation and to promote individual, community and national well-being. This will focus on boosting cultural provision and participation in communities and harnessing the goodwill and engagement generated by the 2016 commemorative programme.

The core proposition of this programme is that participation in cultural activity drives personal and collective creativity, with significant implications for individual and societal well-being and achievement. The Creative Ireland Programme is the main implementation vehicle for the priorities identified in Culture 2025/Éire Ildánach, the draft cultural policy which I published last year and which sees a vibrant cultural ecosystem as essential to society.

The programme is based on five pillars:

- Enabling the creative potential of every child

- Enabling creativity in every community

- Investing in our creative and cultural infrastructure

- Establishing Ireland as a centre of excellence in media production

-Unifying our global reputation

Specifically the 5^thPillar - Unifying our Global Reputation- is about presenting a coherent representation of Ireland to the world as a creative people. This will seek to capture the overarching narrative of Ireland’s unique creativity and cultural heritage, and builds on the work of Culture Ireland, a division of my Department, which has an existing remit to promote Irish arts worldwide. The Government’s intentions in this regard were welcomed when I launched the Creative Ireland Programme on the international stage in New York in January and in London last week.

In addition, the Action Plan for Rural Development, which I launched with the Taoiseach last month, 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 Action Plan is an overarching structure for the co-ordination and implementation of initiatives right across Government which will benefit rural Ireland. It takes a cohesive and coordinated approach across the whole of Government to the implementation of both economic and social policies that impact on rural communities.

The Plan contains 276 actions which aim to improve both the economic and social fabric of rural Ireland spread across five pillars.

Arts and Heritage are covered under the fourth pillar of the plan - 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 policy initiatives are supported by significant additional resources which are being directed towards the arts and culture sector. In Budget 2017 I secured significant additional funding for the Arts Council and the Irish Film Board. The increase in the Arts Council's allocation in 2017 is €5 million, or 8%, and will assist the Council greatly in implementing its 10-year strategy Making Great Art Work (2016-2025). I also secured an increase of €2 million for the Irish Film Board, representing a 14% increase in its annual budget.

Budget 2017 also includes:.

- increased funding for all of the National Cultural Institutions;

- an increase of €1 million for Culture Ireland;

- an additional €1 million to the Heritage Council; and

- funding of €5m for the implementation of the Creative Ireland Programme.

I also recently announced details of more than €9 million in capital funding for existing dedicated arts and culture centres across the country. The Arts and Culture Capital Scheme is the most significant investment in arts and cultural centres in a decade and will target investment at a range of different facilities, including arts centres, theatres, galleries and museums, as well as artists’ studios and creative spaces. This kind of investment is at the centre of what I am trying to achieve through Creative Ireland Programme and the Action Plan for Rural Development.

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

These initiatives and additional funding will all support the achievement of the objectives set out in the questions.