Tony McLoughlin (Sligo-Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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433. To ask the Minister for Health if the national lottery grant funding has been discontinued and moved to Healthy Ireland; the way in which organisations can now access large grant funding for capital investment projects, noting that the Health Service Executive's lottery funding is capped at €10,000; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23095/17]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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My Department no longer operates a National Lottery Fund. In 2016, the last year for which the fund was extant, grants totalling €3.286m were approved and paid to 136 organisations. The fund was used to provide once-off grants to community and voluntary organisations providing a range of health related services. It was not the practice to use the fund for the provision of large grants for capital investment projects.

As the Deputy is aware, the HSE operates a similar scheme and continues to provide grants to health agencies and other organisations from National Lottery funds.

The Deputy may wish to note that the Healthy Ireland Fund is not a successor or replacement for the Department's National Lottery Fund. The aim of the Healthy Ireland Fund will be to support innovative, cross-sectoral, evidence based projects, programmes and initiatives that support the implementation of the key national policies in areas such as Obesity, Smoking, Alcohol, Physical Activity and Sexual Health.