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Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 15 Feb 1994

Vol. 438 No. 7

Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Leader 2 Programme.

Pat Upton

Question:

18 Dr. Upton asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the initiatives, if any, he has planned to encourage local authorities, alone or in partnership with other agencies, to participate in the Leader 2 programme; and the plans, if any, he has to encourage county enterprise boards to participate in Leader 2.

Pat Upton

Question:

39 Dr. Upton asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry when the Leader 2 programme will be introduced; the differences, if any, between the terms of this programme and those of the Leader 1 programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Michael P. Kitt

Question:

58 Mr. M. Kitt asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the up-to-date position on the inclusion of areas of unemployment in County Galway in the Leader programme.

Trevor Sargent

Question:

78 Mr. Sargent asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry the plans, if any, the Government has to revitalise rural areas in view of the fact that many major road schemes have done much to alienate and impoverish rural communities resulting in migration to cities and emigration abroad.

Michael Creed

Question:

132 Mr. Creed asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry if he envisages that control of Leader 2 funding will remain within his Department; and if he envisages any role for the newly established county enterprise boards.

Jimmy Deenihan

Question:

200 Mr. Deenihan asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Forestry if he intends to draw up guidelines regarding the composition of membership and the structure of the new Leader boards and if he will make a statement on the matter.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 18, 39, 58, 78, 132 and 200 together.

The terms of the Leader 2 programme are a matter for decision by the European Commission. I understand that a draft of the new programme will be available shortly from the Commission for discussion with member states, and consultation with the European Parliament. In these circumstances it is likely to be well into the second half of 1994 before the new round is in operation.

For the reasons indicated, I am unable to say precisely what types of groups will be eligible for Leader 2. The current programme allowed for the participation of public, private or mixed bodies and, in keeping with the "bottom-up" principle of rural development in empowering local communities, I expect to see the same flexibility in Leader 2.

For similar reasons, it is not possible at this stage to indicate that any particular area will be covered by the new programme. The Government's commitment to Leader is very clearly spelled out in the National Development Plan and the Government is satisfied that Leader can be applied effectively to all rural areas. To achieve this, it is vital that sufficient numbers of well-organised groups with good business plans come forward to participate in the next round of Leader. Given my responsibility for rural development, I expect that Leader 2 will operate, once again, under the aegis of my Department.

Apart from Leader, rural areas will benefit from other measures proposed in the National Development Plan. For example, aid will continue to be available for a whole range of alternative farm enterprises involving non-surplus products including horticulture, sport horses, deer and rural tourism. In addition, the designation of ten new rural areas for participation in the local development programme, as announced last week, is a further advance in the Government's strategy to combat unemployment in disadvantaged areas.

Will the Minister agree that Offaly County Council's involvement in the Leader 1 programme was particularly successful and that the experience gained from that council's involvement in that programme could be applied successfully to a number of other local authorities? Will he further agree that the expertise and experience of the professional staff of Offaly County Council was an important factor in ensuring the success of the Leader 1 programme in County Offaly?

I agree that the Leader programme has been an outstanding success in County Offaly and I compliment Offaly County Council on its administration of the programme. Many other local authorities assisted community groups, etc., in the implementation of the Leader programme in their areas. There are no specific criteria in regard to the people who will be entitled to make applications, prepare business plans, etc. It will be open to statutory authorities, community organisations and individuals to submit business plans to the Department for consideration in the context of what I hope will be a national Leader programme.

In view of the fact that the Leader 2 programme is coming on stream, will the Minister agree that he has an obligation to sort out a problem which exists at county level where, due to a lack of co-ordination at Government level, there is duplication, confusion and overlapping by too many organisations and not enough co-ordination? Will he agree that difficulties are arising because the Leader programme is being operated by the Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry and the county enterprise boards, county development teams, local authorities and national bodies are all dealing with similar areas and groups? This overlapping and duplication is having the opposite effect to that being sought by the Minister in regard to rural development. Does the Minister regard the Leader 2 programme as an opportunity to sort out that problem and put in place at county level structures which will deal with these problems? As the Minister recognises the problems which exist——

I wish to raise a question about the time lag in the second half of the year. The Minister referred to this issue before but it is now of critical importance. How does the Minister intend to deal with existing Leader projects which will come to an end during the next few months and will run out of money? How does the Minister propose to deal with that time lag, particularly in regard to the people employed under the schemes?

The focus on all schemes, whether they come under the Leader Operational Programme for Rural Development or the county enterprise boards, is to deal with the major problem of unemployment. The Government has taken a very positive stand in regard to national schemes, the county enterprise boards — the statutory structures at county level — and, most important, as was clearly demonstrated yesterday by the Taoiseach in his presentation, in giving communities the opportunity to become involved in what I like to describe as nation building through community development. I do not think this should give rise to any conflict of interest. The Leader programme is very different to the measures being taken at national level or by the county enterprise boards. Under the Leader programme local communities come together in isolation from statutory structures to identify the community's potential for development and to prepare a business plan for submission to the Department for funding by the European Commission and national Government.

There has been a tremendous response to that programme. Yesterday we were able to demonstrate that within that pilot programme, which has been running for approximately 18 months, we will create approximately 2,000 full time jobs and approximately 5,000 part time jobs. Due to the fact that the programme has a "bottom up" approach to rural development and is community-based and community orientated, I do not believe statutory agencies would be able to create these jobs.

In addition to the national and county agencies, the county enterprise boards, there is a need for voluntary community participation through programmes such as the Leader programme. The Leader programme is being evaluated by an independent person who will clearly demonstrate the success of the programme. I am satisfied that we will be able to demonstrate to Europe — it is a European pilot programme — the success of the programme being administered in Ireland.

(Laoighis-Offaly): Coming from an area which has benefited from the Leader programme, I agree with the Minister's positive assessment of it. In view of the likely demonstration of its advantages by areas which have benefited from the Leader 1 programme to areas which would like to benefit from the Leader 2 programme, is it necessary for the Government to strongly urge the European Commission to increase substantially the funding for the latter programme to give such areas a better chance to do so? In the context of the review of the Leader 1 programme in preparation for the Leader 2 programme, will the Minister agree that two of the main issues which need to be addressed are matching funding, particularly in very deprived areas which might not be immediately able to provide the necessary resources, and building-up the capacity of local communities which perhaps do not have a tradition in training or education in terms of community development so that they can benefit from the Leader 2 programme?

With regard to the Leader 2 programme and funding, I am very optimistic that the amount allocated to the next programme will be sufficient to enable us to have a national programme. Therefore, I hope that what has been a very successful pilot programme in 16 areas can be extended on a national basis. The amount of funding likely to become available will be made known in the draft programme which is being prepared and which, hopefully, will be circulated within the next few weeks. I have noted Deputy Gallagher's point in regard to the importance of training. This is an appropriate time for me to congratulate the Deputy on obtaining a masters degree in rural development. Training is important in the context of our experiences in the delivery of the Leader 1 programme.

Deputy Gallagher asked about matching funding. From our experience of Leader that has been a difficulty for some groups. I hope we will be able to negotiate, in the context of Leader 2, a certain measure of flexibility on how best we can address the problems of communities who find it difficult to raise the 50 per cent local community funding.

Deputy McManus asked about the time lag between the current Leader 1 programme and the commencement of Leader 2. Quite honestly, I am also concerned about that because I can identify with the difficulties. We had many discussions with the European Commission in relation to trying to source funds to bridge the gap between Leader 1 and Leader 2. I have to confess we have not been successful on the sourcing of that level of funding. We will continue to discuss this matter within the Department and with the Leader network to see if there is any way we can be of assistance. The Deputy was correct in stating that we have in place within the 16 pilot schemes well qualified people and I would not want to see them lost to Leader 2. I regret to say that I do not have a positive response to the Deputy's point in regard to this.

Does the Minister consider it important that in future these programmes would be run over a long period? While I accept the original programme was a pilot project, one of the negative features of most of these EU programmes to date, including the IRD and the Leader programme, is their short-term nature? Would the Minister accept that community development is a long drawn out process and that if we want to achieve long-term results we must have long-term programmes? Is it correct to infer from the Minister's statement that in the long-term he hopes to see all rural communities covered by some Leader programme? There certainly has been a feeling of isolation among people in areas adjacent to those that are included in a programme.

I agree with the Deputy that the time factor and the lack of continuity is a disadvantage to the delivery of community development programmes. However, I remind the House that we are talking about what was initially a five year pilot scheme; it took almost two years to get the structures in place. Effectively we were talking about little less than three years for the delivery of the programme. Deputy Ó Cuív is correct in stating that there is a need for continuity in this regard and I hope that the Commission can now endorse the success of Leader not only in Ireland but at European level also, that there will also be an acceptance of the importance of the continuity of the programme and that between the ending of Leader 2 and the commencement of Leader 3 there will not be the time lag which Deputy McManus and others identified. However, we must acknowledge that we are dealing with a pilot programme.

I wish to return to the essential point of Deputy Upton's question which was in regard to building a partnership between various agencies such as local authorities and county enterprise boards. In County Roscommon I am certainly interested in building partnerships with, say, the county enterprise board because enterprise will develop from rural based enterprises and the economic fabric has been so weakened by neglect and so on that we must look to that area. I accept the Minister's point that the Leader programme must be allowed to be as independent as possible but there is the problem of matching funds in areas where funding is difficult to raise — 50 per cent is rather low. A county enterprise board may be interested in giving additional funding to a project——

I ask the Deputy to be brief. Other Deputies wish to contribute.

I thank you for your patience, Sir. Let us assume that a county enterprise board was willing to give an additional 20 or 25 per cent, will the Minister agree that should be allowed to go ahead rather than falling foul of a Civil Service regulation which would have the effect of killing what would otherwise be a worthy project?

I would be very disappointed to discover that there was any conflict of interest between the community concept of Leader and the important work which will be undertaken by, for example, the county enterprise boards. We are talking about people and communities within counties and I can see no reason there should not be sufficient dialogue between county enterprise boards and Leader management groups with regard to harmonising their respective programmes for community development. There is a place for both and I am satisfied they can work in harmony.

I am satisfied also that we will achieve our objective in the context of trying to create the maximum number of jobs by way of the application of schemes which are being undertaken by the Government, and the regional and local authority schemes which will be delivered by the county enterprise boards. There will then be the potential to develop, at local and community level, other opportunities for job creation. The only way forward is for the Government, the statutory authorities and the communities to work together with a common goal to build this nation through community development. There should be no conflict of interest and I would be extremely disappointed if that was the case because members of local authorities are also members of local communities. I was a member of a local authority for 25 years and I know how close local public representatives are to their local communities. I would abhor the thought of any conflict of interest between communities working together and the statutory agencies.

It is important that urgent funding is allocated to the new Leader programme because the momentum has built up and many of the projects have been dealt with. The Minister should recommend Leader groups to have close liaison with the county enterprise boards. I am a member of a county enterprise board and we sought a meeting with the Leader groups. In future, the projects will be divided into two groups; those more suitable to Leader and those of a more industrial nature suitable to the enterprise boards. There has never been a better opportunity to take up funding but, unfortunately, the local authorities do not have it. If the local authorities had sufficient funding for community groups, much work would be done and real community rural development programmes would be dealt with.

I indicated earlier that in the context of our submission to the European Commission for Leader 2, we recommended a greater degree of flexibility in relation to the 50 per cent local contribution. We also recommended, for example, that there should be a combination of direct grants and perhaps low interest loans to local communities.

We recommend also that there should be some kind of revolving fund under which successful groups would be in a position to repay some capital grants, which would maintain a continuity of funding to assist with the seed capital necessary for further development. We have made positive proposals arising from our experiences with Leader 1. I am not in a position to say to what extent the Commission is likely to take these recommendations on board. Hopefully, we will have the discussion document available within a couple of weeks which will enable this House, communities generally and local authorities to become involved in a debate. I should like to think that such a debate would not last too long because I am anxious to see Leader 2 come on stream fairly soon. I hope that at the end of the day, our experiences will be incorporated in the new proposal.

I should like to hear from the Minister of State that he is sure when Leader 2 will begin. I am extremely worried by his commitment to have the provisions of the Leader 2 programme guaranteed nationwide. Has the Minister made that remark before being sure what finance is available? Will the moneys be spread over such a wide area it will mean nothing to the country as a whole? Areas such as Cavan-Monaghan desperately needed the Leader programme. If its provisions are to be spread nationally — perhaps even to the city of Dublin — at least we would need to be sure that we had sufficient moneys to supply the needs of those areas where success has been proven. It would be wrong to have such funding removed from areas doing well under the Leader 1 programme merely to spread it more widely.

The Deputy made a valid point. The extent to which it can become a national programme will depend on the amount of funding made available by the European Union. On the last occasion, there were 32 applications under the Irish Leader programme, 16 of which were selected by the European Commission for funding. I indicated earlier that I would be hopeful, if not optimistic, that the level of funding to be made available under Leader 2 would be substantially greater than under Leader 1. In that context I want to see the programme made available to communities nationwide. The discussion document will contain an indication of the amount of money to be made available globally to the Leader programme. We will then be in a better position to assess to what extent we can extend its provisions nationally. While acknowledging that the 16 pilot areas were all important and clearly demonstrated the potential of the programme, we cannot be selfish——

We never are.

——in relation to the 16 areas that have benefited. To the extent that it can be extended nationally, that would be my objective but only within the context of sufficient funds being made available.

I am concerned that the Minister of State seems to be unaware of the problem of lack of co-ordination between bodies at local level. Will he consider a report on County Wicklow published very recently which pinpointed one of the difficulties in relation to job creation as the lack of co-ordination between the different agencies? While it appears that the Minister is viewing the programme to a certain extent through rose tinted glasses, will he avail of the opportunity to deal with the problems under Leader 2? Rural enterprise very often means having to approach four or five different agencies making the same case to obtain funding whereas the idea of a one-stop-shop would make an enormous difference to rural communities or individuals endeavouring to develop enterprise in their areas? Will he accept that co-ordination is a genuine problem and how does he consider it might be resolved before beginning Leader 2?

Certainly I will give serious thought to how best we can co-ordinate all these programmes. It has not been my experience that there is a conflict of interest between the 16 Leader groups and statutory agencies nationwide. On the contrary, it has been my experience that there has been a very high level of co-operation and, in many cases, participation — Deputy Upton recognised its success in Offaly — statutory support and very often involvement with the voluntary community agencies, such as the various Leader groups. However, as the Deputy made the point that there is a need perhaps for a greater degree of co-ordination I will examine that matter to ascertain to what extent that may be justified. One of the strengths of the Leader programme is the fact that it is community-based, that there is the minimum level of interference, if you like, on the part of the Department, myself or whoever. While not wanting to appear to be engaging in self praise, I think there would be an acknowledgement that the Leader programme has been administered with the minimum of bureaucracy by the Department. Indeed the only occasions I had to visit Leader groups was in a complimentary fashion, to ascertain what they were doing and to encourage them but there has never been any undue interference by me or my Department.

The Minister's reply implied that local authorities and county enterprise boards were in conflict with Leader, they are not; we are saying that the county enterprise boards and local authorities do not consider they have permission to co-operate with Leader; in other words, they are afraid that the Department of the Environment might tell a local authority it is acting ultra vires by further matching funds under a Leader programme that might otherwise lead to the creation of a number of jobs; that if this additional funding was not obtained from an agency such as a county enterprise board a project might fail. All we are asking is that the Minister works with his channels in Government to encourage local authorities and county enterprise boards in every possible way so that they would never find themselves in conflict with the law, or ultra vires in their actions in co-operating with the provisions of the Leader programme throughout the various regions accredited to that programme nationwide.

I find it very difficult to follow the logic of what Deputy Connor says because it has not been my experience——

It has been mine.

I have found, within the context of Leader, a great willingness on the part of local authorities to support that bottom-up approach to community development. I reiterate that the Deputy should not lose sight of Government focus in dealing with the problem of unemployment for example, the national programmes, the community enterprise schemes at local authority level and the new bottom-up approach involving communities in the work of nation building. Indeed it is only through co-ordinating national, regional, local authority and community-based programmes——

The Government is not co-ordinating them.

——that we can come to grips with the problem of job creation. I do not accept the criticism levelled by the Deputy because the Government is doing that very effectively.

It is not.

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