Creative Economy

Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 29 February 2012

Wednesday, 29 February 2012

Ceisteanna (134)

Regina Doherty

Ceist:

137 Deputy Regina Doherty asked the Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht with regard to the creative economy programme, the numbers of projects that are running here at present; the location and the categories of same; the number of persons employed on these projects; the total amount of funding secured from the EU for same; the projected amount of the €70 million of funding that Ireland hopes to secure during the life of the programme; and the information that has been made available to interested community based groups regarding the creative economy programme. [11686/12]

Freagraí scríofa

Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht (Deputy Jimmy Deenihan)

The Deputy will appreciate that, at present, there are two EU programmes operating within the areas for which I have responsibility:

1. The Media Programme is the EU support programme for the European audiovisual industry and details are available at www.mediadeskireland.ie; and

2. The Culture Programme is the EU support programme for organisations working in the field of culture and details are available at www.ccp.ie.

Discussions are currently underway between the Member States and the European Commission on a new framework programme for the cultural and creative sectors. This will run from 2014 to 2020 and will be called the Creative Europe Programme. A budget of some €1,800 million is mooted for the new programme but this is not finalised and will have to be considered in the context of the overall EU Budget. It includes a proposal to amalgamate the current Culture and MEDIA programmes under a common framework and create an entirely new facility to improve access to finance.