Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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My Department operates two capital funding programmes for sport, namely the Sports Capital and Equipment Programme (SCEP) and the Large Scale Sport Infrastructure Fund (LSSIF).

The National Sports Policy published in 2018 provided for the establishment of the LSSIF. The aim of the fund is to provide support for larger sports facilities where the Exchequer investment is greater than the maximum amount available under the SCEP. The first call for proposals under the LSSIF closed in 2019 with applications confined to local authorities and National Governing Bodies of Sport. The first LSSIF allocations were announced in January 2020 and thus far, approximately €124 million has been awarded to 33 different proposals.

A new round of the LSSIF will open for applications in the coming weeks, with the dates, terms and conditions to be published on the Department’s website in the coming weeks. I would encourage all eligible projects to consider applying for this competitive application process when it opens.

Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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584. To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht to outline all pathways through which adult women's football teams can access funding from her Department; and the dates on which the next rounds for applications for available programmes will open. [15188/24]

Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party)
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Sport Ireland, which is funded by my Department, is the statutory body with responsibility for the development of sport, increasing participation at all levels and raising standards, including the allocation of funding across its various programmes. Sport Ireland channels the funding through the relevant National Governing Body of sport. Sport Ireland allocates its funding for football to the FAI.

I have accordingly referred the Deputy's question to Sport Ireland for direct reply. I would ask the Deputy to inform my office if a reply is not received within 10 days.

With regard to capital support, the Sports Capital and Equipment Programme (SCEP) is the primary vehicle for Government support for the development of sports and recreation facilities and the purchase of non-personal sports equipment throughout the country. Over 13,000 projects have now benefited from sports capital funding since 1998, bringing the total allocations in that time to over €1.15 billion. The Programme for Government commits to continuing the SCEP and to prioritising the investment in disadvantaged areas.

The latest round of the SCEP (2023) closed for applications on Friday 8 September, 2023. A preliminary examination of the submitted applications demonstrates that the Programme has again generated a very large number of applications. The total number of 3,210 applications exceeds the record number submitted under the last (2020) round.

The "Scoring System and Assessment Manual" for the 2023 round has been finalised and published along with a list of all applications received by county including the relevant sport type for each application received. The detailed assessment work has commenced and it is planned to assess the "equipment-only" applications first and announce these grants in the coming months. Work will then commence on assessing the capital applications with the allocations to be announced later.