Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 24 April 2018
519. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the criteria applied in the review process for applications for a sports capital grant; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [17864/18]
View answerUnder the 2017 round of the Sports Capital Programme (SCP), 20% of applications were deemed to be invalid. This was the lowest rate of invalid applications ever under the SCP (the average over all previous programmes was 34%) and showed that the efforts made to reduce the number of invalid applications were largely successful.
In relation to the appeals process, all organisations whose applications were deemed invalid or partially invalid were invited to appeal the Department’s decision if they believed the Department made an error in deeming the application invalid. The introduction of the appeals process ensures that the SCP accords with the Department’s Customer Action Plan, which commits to maintaining "a formalised, well publicised, accessible, transparent and simple to use system of appeal/review for customers who are dissatisfied with decisions in relation to service”.
Each appeal submitted was assessed by an official not involved in the original assessment of that application. All decisions on appeals were also reviewed by at least two more senior officials. A total of 149 appeals were submitted and of these, 35 were upheld. Appeals were accepted where the appellant demonstrated that the Department erred in its decision to make the application invalid, or where it was agreed that the Department's own guide to making an application was not sufficiently clear, or where it was felt the original decision involved an overly strict interpretation of the SCP terms and conditions. More detail is contained in the review of the 2017 round of the SCP, which has been published on my Department's website (www.dttas.ie).
All clubs with applications that remain invalid have been informed that they can resubmit their 2017 application, along with any corrected documentation to make their application valid for the next round of the SCP without the necessity of submitting a full new application. I expect an announcement will be made shortly regarding when the new round of the programme will be open for applications.
