Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein)
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432. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if she will extend the period for which applications will be accepted for funding under the 2021 live performance support scheme until 23 April 2021. [16514/21]

Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party)
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I was pleased to recently announce a new €50 million suite of support measures for the live entertainment sector. As part of this suite of supports, an allocation of €25 million is being made available under the Live Performance Support Scheme 2021. This scheme builds on the successful outcomes of the pilot Live Performance Support Scheme (LPSS) in 2020, which provided thousands of days of employment to hundreds of musicians, actors, crew and technicians and the valuable insights gained. This new scheme is aimed at commercial venues, producers and promoters in the culture sector and will support employment and wellbeing opportunities across all genres and continued high quality artistic output for the general public.

The scheme has been developed following extensive consultation with the sector. The scheme allows for applications to be submitted over a four-week period to my Department, closing on 14th April 2021. A further period for the evaluation of applications is then necessary before offers of funding can be made. Feedback from the sector indicates a overwhelming preference for early confirmation of application outcomes, to allow for lead in times for successful events and programmes.