Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)
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The sport sector has been severely impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic and the National Governing Bodies of Sport (NGBs) and sports clubs throughout the country have faced significant operational and financial challenges as a result.

As I recently confirmed to the Sport Monitoring Group, a new funding package will shortly be announced to provide financial support to the sporting sector in addition to the €26.3 million additional current funding already provided to Sport Ireland to support the sport sector in 2021. Sport Ireland will shortly arrange for the invitation of applications from NGBs and sports clubs with the aim of distributing this funding. In 2020, a total Covid-19 funding package of €88.5 million was provided to support the sport sector. This significant investment benefited all levels of the sport sector, including thousands of grassroots clubs across the country, and provided some certainty for sporting organisations in their planning for 2021. The 2020 funding package included support for the three main field sports organisations (the FAI, GAA and IRFU), a Resilience Fund to support the National Governing Bodies of Sport, a Sports Club Resilience Fund to support clubs, a Sports Restart and Renewal Fund, and a Swimming Pools Fund.