Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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524. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the amount of funding given to Comhairle na Tuaithe per year since 2008 in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31356/18]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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525. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the membership list of Comhairle na Tuaithe per year since 2008; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31357/18]

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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526. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the main achievements of Comhairle na Tuaithe since 2015; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31358/18]

Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 524 to 526, inclusive, together.

Comhairle Na Tuaithe (The Countryside Council) was originally established in February 2004 with a primary focus on the priority areas of:

- access to the countryside,

- developing a countryside code and

- developing a countryside recreation strategy.

Comhairle na Tuaithe provides a consultative forum in a partnership framework for countryside recreation, from which a National Countryside Code and a National Countryside Recreation Strategy were developed in a manner that respected the rights of the landowner and the reasonable expectations of the recreational user, and where issues over access could be addressed.

Comhairle na Tuaithe has a broad membership representing farming organisations, state land managers, recreational groups and state bodies with an interest in recreation in the Irish countryside. The table below out the membership since Comhairle was established.

Its remit is to discuss and advise on matters relating to rural recreation and activity tourism in the countryside. It is also engaged in progressing the aims and objectives of the National Countryside Recreation Strategy.

My Department currently chairs Comhairle na Tuaithe and provides the Secretariat for the group. Comhairle na Tuaithe is not a funding body in its own right and therefore it has no funding allocated directly to it. However, Departments with responsibility for Comhairle na Tuaithe since its establishment have provided some funding to progress various projects, including for pilot Mountain Access projects in the MacGillacuddy Reeks and Mount Gable. Funding was also provided for a review of Comhairle na Tuaithe which was completed in March 2016.

The report made a number of recommendations regarding the future structure and remit of Comhairle na Tuaithe and in that regard I met with members of the group on the 13th of February last to hear directly from them their views on the recommendations of the independent review, the future direction of Comhairle, and the development of the outdoor recreation sector in Ireland generally.

I am currently considering that feedback, and additional feedback received through my officials, in the context of a wider focus on the development of the rural recreation sector generally.  I will make a final decision regarding the future operation of Comhairle na Tuaithe shortly.

Member Organisations of Comhairle na Tuaithe: