Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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76. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she has had discussions with the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government with regard to amending the Arts Act 2003 in order to require each local authority to have a ring-fenced arts budget as recommended by arts advocacy organisations such as an organisation (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [39831/18]

Josepha Madigan (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy will appreciate issues in relation to local government law are a matter for my colleague the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government. I can assure the Deputy that I work closely with Minister Murphy to promote the Arts and I recently joined with him and the Taoiseach to launch all 31 local authority Culture and Creativity Strategies which are jointly funded by my Department and the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government.

I understand that local government legislation has specific provision enabling local authorities to promote arts and culture within their functional area. While I appreciate that some groups have called for the law to be changed to make it a requirement for arts funding to be non-discretionary I am not convinced that this would actually make a difference to expenditure on the ground. All local authorities already make provision for expenditure in the arts. A mandatory provision would not change the level of funding provided as councillors would still continue to balance expenditure proposals across all local authority programmes as is currently the case. It is far better in my view for local authorities to embrace cultural and artistic provision because they see the transformative engagement which the arts and culture can bring to local communities. I think that the experience of the Ireland 2016 Centenary Programme and now the Creative Ireland Programme have been instrumental in raising awareness at local government level of the value of this engagement.

For my part I will work to improve the resources which flow to local authorities through the Arts Council and through the Creative Ireland Programme in partnership with the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government.

The Taoiseach has declared his intention on more than once occasion that he is committed to doubling funding for arts, culture and sport over a seven year period. The Government is already delivering on this objective. Last April we launched Investing in our Culture, Language and Heritage,a 10 year capital plan which will support cultural infrastructure nationwide.

2019 Budget discussions are still underway, but I am happy to confirm that I have already increased funding for the sector in 2018, with the Arts Council receiving €68m in funding from my Department in 2018, up €8m in 2 years.

This funding supports the Arts Council's 10 year strategic agreement with the County and City Management Association which underpins the close collaboration between the Arts Council and local government.

This engagement complements Pillar 2 of the Creative Ireland Programme, where local authorities are the primary instruments of community engagement for of the Programme entitled Enabling Creativity in Every Community throughout Ireland.