Vol. 431 No. 3
173 Mr. Durkan asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry if progress to date on proposals for the expenditure of EC Structural or Cohesion Funds under schemes operated by his Department or previously operated by his Department, is in accordance with projections, with particular reference to the Programme for a Partnership Government 1993-1997; and if he will make a statement on the matter.
I assume the Deputy is referring to the post 1993 period of Structural Funds. The position is that my Department has forwarded broad proposals to the Department of Finance covering the agriculture, rural development, food and forestry areas. These proposals are still being considered in the context of finalising Ireland's National Development Plan and the Government will shortly make decisions on the allocations of funds for each Department. No decisions on individual measures to be aided can be made until all allocations for each Department are known.
Commitments in the Programme for Partnership Government in the structural area will be taken fully into account when finalising our programmes.
As the Cohesion Fund relates specifically to large scale environmental and transport projects, my Department will not be involved.
