Colm Burke
Question:292. Deputy Colm Burke asked the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media the details of the sports capital appeals process; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10964/22]
View answerTuesday, 1 March 2022
Questions (292, 293)
Colm Burke
Question:293. Deputy Colm Burke asked the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media if funding has been ring-fenced for successful appeals to the Sports Capital Programme decision; the amount of funding which has been set aside for same; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10965/22]
View answerWritten answers
I propose to take Questions Nos. 292 and 293 together.
The Sports Capital and Equipment Programme (SCEP) is the primary vehicle for Government support for the development of sports and recreation facilities and the purchase of non-personal sports equipment throughout the country. Over 13,000 projects have now benefited from sports capital funding since 1998, bringing the total allocations in that time to over €1.1 billion. The Programme for Government commits to continuing the SCEP and to prioritising investment in disadvantaged areas.
The 2020 round of the Programme closed for applications on 1 March 2021. By this date, 3,106 applications were submitted seeking over €200 million in funding. This is the highest number of applications ever received.
The scoring system and assessment procedures were finalised and published prior to assessment work commencing and all applications were assessed in accordance with these procedures. All of the improvements which were introduced for recent rounds of the Programme to make the process as user-friendly as possible were maintained for this round. This included giving applicants a second chance to submit corrected documentation. The full scoring system and assessment procedures can be viewed on the sportscapitalprogramme.ie website.
Approximately one thousand of the submitted applications were for 'equipment-only' projects. These applications were assessed first and grants with a total value of €16.6m were announced on 6 August 2021. The remaining capital applications were then assessed and 1,865 individual grant offers with a total value of over €143.8 million were announced on Friday 11 February 2022.
My Department will soon be in contact with all unsuccessful applicants. All of these organisations will have the opportunity to appeal the Department's decision and full details of the appeals procedure will issue shortly. Of the record €150 million made available for capital projects, €6 million has been kept in reserve for any successful appeals lodged by unsuccessful applicants.
When the appeals process is complete, a full review of the 2020 round of the SCEP will be undertaken and any recommendations contained therein will be included in the terms and conditions of the next round. The precise timing of this next round of the Programme will be announced once this review is complete.