Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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362.To ask the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht if the Minister will outline her Department's plans to improve funding to grassroots football; if she is aware of the lack of funding for this and that there is on average between 0 and 1 full time coaches per club; if she agrees that there is a need to invest in better facilities, provide more funding for coaches, offer more grants to local teams; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [25377/24]

Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)
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Government funding for the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) is primarily aimed at supporting the delivery of programmes at local level.

Considerable additional financial support has been provided by the state for the development of football in Ireland, particularly through the 2020 - 2023 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the government and the FAI. The MOU provided for a package of funding of €5.8 million per annum to the FAI during that 4-year period up to 2023 for football development.

The Department has recently received proposals from the FAI regarding additional funding support for another period and also in relation to the development of academies. These proposals are being examined by my officials, in consultation with Sport Ireland, and they will make recommendations to myself and Minister Catherine Martin in due course.

I acknowledge the important role of grassroots sport and the government is committed to supporting football at grassroots level and to investing in football. In that regard, over €68.7 million has been allocated to the FAI between 2019 and 2023, including €24.4 million specifically to support football development and aimed at promoting participation in football by young people. I will continue to encourage all sporting organisations, including the FAI, to develop their sports and to ensure that opportunities exist at grassroots level for people to participate in sport.

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. Since 1998, over 13,000 projects have now benefited from sports capital funding, bringing the total allocations in that time to over €1.15 billion. The Programme for Government commits to continuing the SCEP and to prioritising investment in disadvantaged areas and groups that are currently underrepresented in terms of participation.

For the 2020 round of the programme alone, almost 2,900 different projects received a grant offer, with over €166.6 million allocated. The main field sports such as GAA, soccer and rugby fared very well.

Examination of the submitted applications demonstrates that the 2023 Programme has again generated a very large number of applications. The total number of 3,210 applications exceeds the record number submitted under the previous 2020 round and the total funding applied for is €359 million representing an 80% increase over the amount applied for in the 2020 SCEP.

The Scoring System and Assessment Manual for the 2023 round has been 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 "equipment-only" applications were assessed first.

On 9 May 2024, Minister Martin and I announced over €26 million in equipment grants under the latest round of the SCEP. The grants have been provisionally allocated to organisations across the country and to over fifty sports and activities.

Soccer proved to be the greatest beneficiary by far of the ‘Equipment Only’ allocations accounting for 136 allocations totalling €4.4 million. This includes an allocation of €500,000 to the FAI itself to fund a nationwide schools football scheme.

Further allocations, including those for capital works and capital works with an equipment component, will be announced by Autumn. As for the likely scale of the budget available for the current round, Minister Martin and I were pleased to recently confirm that at least €250 million is to be made available for the 2023 round of the SCEP. This is on foot of positive recent engagement on revised allocations for the National Development Plan with Paschal Donohoe, the Minister for Public Expenditure, NDP Delivery and Reform, which has facilitated this largest-ever investment in sports facilities across the country.

The funding now available represents a 50% increase on the funding allocated in early 2022 under the 2020 round of the SCEP and it should mean positive allocation decisions for all valid applications, including many for soccer, under the current 2023 SCEP.