2026-03-03

139. Deputy Thomas Gould asked the Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport whether any specific funding is available for capital projects for women’s sports where the organisation does not currently own a playing pitch. [16724/26]

Will the Minister of State outline whether any specific funding is available for capital projects for women's sports where the organisations do not currently own a playing pitch?

The Government is very much focused on promoting lifelong participation in physical activity and sport for all sectors of society and communities. Our sport for all approach aims to ensure that all persons have the opportunity to participate equally in sport and physical activity, regardless of age, socio-economic status, disability or membership of the LGBTI+ community, the Traveller community or other ethnic minorities, and also regardless of gender. My Department operates two capital funding programmes for sport, namely, the community sports facilities fund, CSFF, and the large-scale sport infrastructure fund, LSSIF. Sporting organisations can apply directly for the CSFF. Applications for the LSSIF must be made through a national governing body or a local authority. There is no gender-specific funding stream within these programmes and the vast majority of projects funded serve both females and males. Capital grant limits for the community sports facilities fund are based on the applicants' projects and security of tenure. Under the 2023 round, funding of up to €200,000 was available to organisations that either owned their land or held a lease registered with Tailte Éireann with at least 15 years remaining. For organisations without a registered chargeable title, capital funding was restricted to a maximum of €70,000, and that was for equipment grants. If an organisation does not own the land in question or have a long lease, the community sports facilities fund provides that the landowner, if entitled to apply for the CSFF funding in its own right, can make an application on behalf of the sports user. This approach can often be seen in the case of sports clubs or organisations located on local authority lands. In the absence of outright ownership, the key objective is to partner and secure a lease for up to 15 years. That lease qualifies the organisation to apply for sports capital funding. Otherwise, the option of applying for equipment-only grants is available to a club even if it does not have access to land. That is up to a maximum of €70,000.

I am very passionate about women's sports. My wife and daughters play camogie. In the constituency I am from, so many young women and girls are successful in sport. Tonight, unfortunately, the soccer team was beaten 2-1 by France and a girl from Knocknaheeny, Denise O'Sullivan, was playing centre field. There are girls like Amy O'Connor and Amy Lee playing Cork senior camogie and winning all-Irelands, Nathalie O'Brien playing in a world cup, basketballer Edel Thornton, Ellie Murray in boxing and Megan Leahy in taekwondo - brilliant young women and girls, but none of them owns a pitch or a facility. As the Minister of State said, if you do not have a lease you cannot get capital funding. A week ago, Wexford went to Clare to play a camogie match. They had nowhere to tog out beforehand, the pitch was a disgrace and there were no hot showers afterwards. It would not be accepted in any male sport but it is acceptable for women. The lease has to be worked on. Women need sports; they need pitches.

We want to be as flexible as we possibly can in supporting all clubs to develop facilities. One source of pressure on clubs is the wonderful increase in female participation in sport in general. That creates additional need for facilities. That is something we want to support through the community sports facilities fund and something we will look at closely. It is important when we give funding that there is assurance around the ownership of the land and the right to use the land for the purpose for which we are contributing significant investment on behalf of the taxpayer. That is why we require ownership of the land or a 15-year lease. There is lots of potential for partnering up with local authorities, schools or through the many clubs across the country which serve both men and women and which want to expand their facilities to meet everyone's needs. We want to support them to do that in the next round of the community sports facilities fund.

The Minister of State must have no concept of what is happening in women's sports. In Cork we have a club, Glanmire ladies football, that is one of the biggest in the county, if not the country. In 2017, it was a junior B club; in 2018, it won the junior A all-Ireland; and in 2024, it won the intermediate all-Ireland. It has four adult teams but the problem is the boys club has five adult teams. The boys do not have enough pitches, so where does that leave the girls? The president of the club, Brian Lotty, told me this evening they have not been on the pitch this year because they have nowhere to go. This is a club with hundreds of members in one of the biggest areas of Cork city, namely Glanmire, and it does not have any playing pitches. Glanmire ladies football is only an example. Will the Government and Minister of State make funding available for them to buy land to put a pitch on? Will the Minister of State fund female sports - soccer, GAA, rugby and others - so they can purchase land to put pitches on? Right now in Glanmire and clubs like it, women are treated like second-class citizens and it is not right.

In relation to making land available, we want to encourage municipal and multipurpose facilities, particularly through working with local authorities. I encourage the Deputy at local level working with the local authorities-----

I spoke to them. There is no land in Glanmire.

-----to see what the opportunities are there. The focus of the Department of sport's funding will be on developing facilities and investing in facilities. We do not have a plan to open that funding up to purchasing land. Were we to do that, many clubs across the country would seek to purchase land under it. Our objective is to put the facilities in place. The primary objective is for the club, partnering with local authorities and others within the community - schools, for example - who may have land, to work to develop facilities. I appreciate the challenge. We want to work with and support the local authorities in any way we can to identify the needs, particularly in growing communities, and make sure they can partner up to develop facilities.

Minister of State, would you look at it at least?