Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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451. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the total monetary amount of non-repayable moneys provided by his Department through grants, funding supports, tax breaks or other means to businesses in each of the years 2020, 2021 and 2022, in tabular form. [3383/23]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The funding allocated to my Department, as set down in the annual Estimates, enables the Department make grant payments to various agencies and bodies that come under the aegis of my Department. These grants are primarily used to fund:

- a range of programmes and initiatives in the further and higher education and research sectors,

- the salaries of further and higher education staff and pensions of retired staff,

- the development of further and higher education infrastructure,

- the provision of student supports, and

- research.

Funding is also provided to enable the Department meet its general administration costs.

The annual Appropriation Account and Revised Estimates for Public Services for my Department's Vote provides detailed information regarding expenditure and receipts.

My Department makes a significant number of payments every year. Such payments are made to individuals and organisations both by way of grants and also for the provision of goods and services to the Department. Some recipients of this funding may be businesses although my Department’s funding programmes are not generally directly aimed at enterprises. Such labels are also not necessarily assigned to payees on the Financial Management System, however if the Deputy wishes to obtain further information regarding specific businesses or grants I will arrange for this information to be provided.