Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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214. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development if she will provide an update in respect of the development of a national funding platform; if she has engaged external consultants in respect of same and the amount expended to date; if she will clarify the role of the Department in the project; if she will provide a schedule of the stakeholders she has engaged with on the project to date; and the date on which the project will go live. [43477/24]

Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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In May 2021, my Department entered into an agreement with Pobal to conduct a scoping exercise on the potential for a ‘National Funding Platform’ of community and voluntary organisations which have a funding relationship with the State.

The overarching purpose of the scoping exercise was to explore options for a funding platform that would reduce the administrative burden on grantees and funders, as well as providing a single source of truth regarding community and voluntary sector recipients of state funding, and the nature of the funding that they received. The scoping exercise for the project has been completed and is under consideration in my Department. In that context, my officials have been engaging with colleagues in a range of other Government Departments and agencies.

It should be noted that any decision to move forward with what would be a significant ICT Development project that could, inter alia, draw data from across Government on a significant number of schemes, programmes, recipients and payments, would require a whole of Government approach. Such an exercise would require Government approval and would also be subject to the conditions set out in the public spending code.