Vol. 546 No. 5
134 Mr. McDowell asked the Minister for Finance the projects in the National Development Plan for which funding has been provided as part of the 2002 Abridged Estimates or announced in the Budget Statement; the level of funding provided; the nature of the works; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32364/01]
I am aware that the Deputy has put down a similar question to other Ministers and their responses will cover NDP provisions for which each Minister is responsible. As Minister for Finance, my Department is directly responsible for the allocation and spending of funds under the Technical Assistance Operational Programme. In addition, provision is made in my Vote for two elements of the Peace Operational Programme. The first covers a measure to encourage co-operation between public bodies North and South. The second is technical assistance, which supports the implementation of the programme and is managed directly by the Special EU Programmes Body. The Abridged Estimates Volume provided 5 million, £3.94 million, in funding for these measures under the Peace Operational Programme.
In the Technical Assistance Operational Programme, funding of 3.896 million, £3.07 million, has been provided in the 2002 Abridged Estimates volume in respect of the NDP-CSF Technical Assistance Programme. The activities under this programme are: the administration costs of the joint Community Support Framework of Ireland 2000-2006 – CSF – and the National Development Plan 2000-2006 – NDP – the development and operation of a computerised system for management and monitoring of CSF and NDP operations; evaluations under the CSF and NDP; information and publicity at NDP-CSF level; the European Regional Development Fund and Cohesion Fund financial control unit; and certain costs in respect of the administrative arrangements for public private partnerships units – PPP.
