Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 27 November 2019
255. Deputy Brendan Smith asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the details of the appeals system available for unsuccessful applicants under the 2018 sports capital programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49399/19]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe 2018 round of the Sports Capital Programme closed for applications on Friday 19th October 2018. By the closing date, 2,337 applications were submitted seeking a total of €162m in funding. This was the highest number of applications ever received. 186 of these applications were for projects that were deemed invalid under the 2017 round of the programme that subsequently submitted corrected documents. These applications were assessed first and approximately €7m in allocations to 170 projects were announced on the 17th January. 619 "equipment only" applications were assessed next and 466 allocations with a value of €9.8m were announced to these organisations in May. All unsuccessful "equipment only" applicants were given the opportunity to appeal the decision. The final allocations for capital works were announced earlier this month with a total of €39.5m allocated to 1,009 projects.
In relation to these latest allocations, my Department will shortly be in contact with all of these applicants with full details of the outcome of the assessment process. All unsuccessful applicants will be invited to appeal the Department's decison if they believe that their application was not correctly assessed according to the published assessment manual.
