Michael Ring (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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43. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade to detail any funding allocated to sporting bodies for events or facilities outside the State in each of the past five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36434/24]

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Ireland has a rich tradition of sporting heritage, both at home and abroad. Sport and sporting events create opportunities for the strengthening of political, economic, and people-to-people links, as well as support the Irish diaspora. They also offer opportunities for Team Ireland to work together to celebrate Ireland’s people and culture, and to promote Ireland as a great place to work, study, trade and invest. My Department provides supports to facilitate sporting bodies through several programmes.

The Reconciliation Fund was established in 1982 to support civil society organisations in creating a better understanding and relations between people and traditions on the island of Ireland, and between Ireland and Britain. The key focus of the Reconciliation Fund is to support projects and organisations that seek either to repair those issues which lead to division, conflict, and barriers, or to build a strong civil society that encompasses all communities. To this end, The Reconciliation Fund supports a wide variety of organisations in the most vulnerable and hard-to-reach communities in Northern Ireland and border counties as well as organisations working on a north-south basis along with a small number of organisations based in Britain.

The Emigrant Support Programme provides financial support specifically for projects and initiatives that increase or improve opportunities for the Irish diaspora and other communities abroad to connect and create a sense of Irish community between the global Irish and their local communities. The Global Games Development Fund (GGDF) is a jointly funded initiative since 2012 by the Department of Foreign Affairs and the GAA. The aim of the fund is to support GAA projects abroad, which deliver and promote meaningful developmental games opportunities. This is in line with the Department’s commitments under the Global Ireland: Ireland’s Diaspora Strategy 2020-2025. Funding of €200,000 per year is provided to the GGDF from the Emigrant Support Programme, with the GAA contributing matched funding. Funding has also been allocated from the Shared Island Civic Society Fund to support the 2024 All-Island Women's Cup.

My Department also provided funding to facilitate travel to promote Irish sport and culture in Colombia in 2023, in line with the commitment in the Global Ireland Strategy for Latin America to promote cooperation and exchange on sport and encourage further development across the region through our work with our diaspora and partnerships with the GAA and other national sporting organisations.

The amount of funding allocated over the past five years has been broken down into a tabular format for the information of the Deputy.

Funding allocated to sporting bodies

* Of this amount, €4,000 was allocated but not drawn down due to Covid-19 restrictions

# Of this amount, €500,000 was allocated to the redevelopment of Gaelic Park in New York