Efforts to secure Mosney in Co Meath as the permanent home of the National Annual Community Games will be discussed today at a meeting between the Minister for Sport, Mr O'Donoghue, and the games' organisers.
The talks are going ahead amid fears that the games would be "fragmented" and would lose impetus if moved from Mosney, a former holiday camp.
Some 500,000 children participate annually in the competition that culminates in the final at Mosney.
Mr O'Donoghue said in the Dáil yesterday that "the responsibility for providing a permanent home for any organisation rests with the organisation itself".
However, he agreed with Labour's spokesman, Mr Jack Wall, that the "ideal solution would be the continuance of the games at Mosney".
He would seek to "progress this proposal and encourage it in every way I can".
Difficulties had arisen in the leasing arrangements at Mosney, now used by the Government to accommodate asylum-seekers, but Mr O'Donoghue said the games would have left Mosney by now except for the efforts of the Reception and Integration Agency (RIA), which has responsibility for the site, and the Department of Justice.
The RIA "is prepared to make every effort to facilitate the continued holding of the community games at Mosney, and I welcome this decision".
Mr Wall said the annual final of the nationally-run event had always been held in Mosney.
The Labour deputy said the fact that the Government had a lease made Mosney "the ideal place for the further development of the community games, not alone for the three weekends of the finals but as a home for the ongoing process of developing the community games throughout the year".
