Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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100. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if his Department has current applications with the European Commission's European Globalisation Fund; and if he is considering new applications in the immediate future. [43096/17]

John Halligan (Waterford, Independent)
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My Department does not have any current applications with the European Commission for support under the European Globalisation Fund.  While there are no firm proposals for applications for EGF support in the immediate future, my Department is continuing to monitor developments in a number of redundancy situations, such as that of Hewlett Packard, to determine whether sustainable cases can be made for EGF support, having regard to the relevant EGF regulatory requirements. Key issues in this regard are the number and timing of  redundancies, the circumstances leading to the redundancies and their impact on the local, regional and national economy.

The Deputy will be aware that Ireland has made 10 successful applications for EGF support to date.  This support, involving EGF co-financing of more than €41million, has assisted over 10,000 former workers and 300 young people not in employment, education and training across the 9 completed programmes.  The position in relation to the 10th programme in respect of PWA International, which concluded in June 2017, is that my officials will be submitting the final report and expenditure declaration on the programme to the European Commission in December.