Breakdown of funding to Mayo Local Enterprise Office outlined
Mayo County Council has been allocated €6.55 million in funding in respect of its Local Enterprise Offices (LEOs) for the period from January 1, 2017, to the end of April, 2022.
The information was furnished to Deputy Michael Ring by the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Leo Varadkar, in response to a parliamentary question.
The annual breakdown is as follows:
2017: €883,450
2018: €927,979
2019: €1,092,490
2020: €1,941,888
2021: €1,696,431
2022: €1,148,467
In response to Deputy Ring's question, the minister also stated: "All of this funding allocated has been drawn down and spent."
Minister Varadkar further elaborated that as part of the government response to the effects on business of the pandemic, his department introduced the Restart Grant Scheme in May 2020.
This scheme was operated on behalf of his department by the 31 local authorities, coordinated through their Local Government Management Agency (LGMA).
Mayo County Council issued €20,220,373 to 3,962 applications approved for the Restart Grant.
Any unused funding was returned to the exchequer.
Minister Varadkar continued: "Upon final closure of the scheme, in line with the provisions of the Scheme Service Level Agreements, an independent audit was commissioned to provide reasonable assurance as to the implementation, monitoring and control of the scheme and reasonable assurance as to the appropriate administration, disbursement and reconciliation of the funding provided by the exchequer for the scheme.
"This is expected to be concluded shortly."
Under the Small Business Assistance Scheme for COVID (SBASC), which was open for application in 2021, Mayo County Council received the following monies over two phases.
It received an initial allocation of €734,210, of which €521,000 was expended and the remaining €213,210 was then brought forward to phase two.
In phase 2 of the scheme, the council received an additional €532,137, giving it a total funding for that phase of €745,347. Of this, €361,000 was expended and €384,347 was returned unspent to the exchequer.
The total spend over the two phases therefore amounted to €882,000 under the scheme.
The SBASC scheme was developed specifically for businesses who were not eligible for CRSS because generally they were not open to the general public, such as wholesalers and caterers.
The minister said the money was allocated to local authorities on the assumption that such businesses numbered about 20% of CRSS-eligible businesses in each local authority area, which proved to be an overestimate nationwide.
Furthermore, the significant reopening of the economy which the government permitted following public health advice from May 10, 202, also greatly reduced demand for the scheme.
"For these reasons, only slightly more than one third of the funds originally sanctioned for the scheme were ultimately spent nationwide.
"A total of 231 applicants in Mayo benefited from grant aid under the scheme. An independent audit of the scheme is currently in progress and an evaluation will be undertaken at a later date," Minister Varadkar explained.
The minister further outlined that Mayo County Council was approved funding of €15,000 in September 2019 by Enterprise Ireland to undertake a feasibility study under the Regional Enterprise Development Fund.
The funding was approved for an options analysis on the former Volex building in Castlebar.
In 2020 a business approached Mayo County Council about renting the remaining section of the Volex building.
Mayo County Council was amenable to this approach and did not proceed with the feasibility study.
No payment was made by Enterprise Ireland to Mayo County Council under this grant offer, the minister added.