The matter that has caused great distress in communities and volunteer organisations across this country is a sudden collapse of tickets.ie. Last week, organisers who logged in to draw down moneys owed to them, moneys that had already been paid by ordinary people buying tickets in good faith, were met instead with a webpage telling them that the company, Tickets.ie, and Oshi Software Limited had ceased trading and were heading into liquidation. There was no warning and no telephone call, only a webpage telling them that the company had gone.

Some organisers in communication with the company the previous day were told their moneys were secure, there was no problem and it was business as usual when discussing ticket sales.

For more than 20 years, Tickets.ie was one of the State's largest independent ticketing platforms.

It was not the choice of the multinational or stadium promoters. It was the choice of the parish festivals, the local arts groups, the community sports clubs and the volunteer community organisations running music festivals to put their town on the map. They are precisely the events that rural and small towns in Ireland need but it is those groups that are now left out of pocket. The sums are not small. Between three festivals, namely, the Rory Gallagher International Festival, Rockathon and the Cowboys and Heroes festival in Ballinamore, organisers have reported collectively being owed in the region of €580,000. One festival alone faces losses of up to €135,000. For a volunteer committee, that is not just a setback; it is ruinous. It is the difference between that festival being run again next summer and having to wrap it up and finish for good.

When a licensed travel agent collapses, customers' moneys are protected because it was decided long ago in this House that businesses holding public moneys would be subject to safeguards in respect of those moneys. It should trouble every Member of this House that ticketing agencies in this State that may hold hundreds of thousands of euro belonging to promoters and ticket buyers can collapse overnight with no equivalent protections, that is, no ring fencing, no bond and no money supplied. The moneys will simply vanish into liquidation. That is a gap in the law of the State and it must be closed.

Will the Minister for enterprise intervene on behalf of the organisations caught in this collapse and will he and the Minister for culture provide and mobilise emergency funding? Second, will the Government commit to regulating the primary ticket sales agents to protect and ring-fence money paid by and being held on behalf of those organisations? We cannot go back but we can ensure that no more people involved in parish councils and community organisations find themselves looking at a webpage and wondering where their money has gone.

I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue. I am aware of the many community groups up and down the country that give so much to organising festivals that benefit the wider community and attract significant numbers of visitors to rural areas. A number of Members put queries to me on this issue during the week. The Minister of State, Deputy Feighan, has been doing a lot of work with a number of festivals in his area. Deputy O'Flynn has outlined how much out of pocket some of the festivals are and the exposure faced by community groups.

I understand there is an intervention in the High Court in relation to this issue. Therefore, I must be careful in what I say. The first point I will make is that protections are very clearly set out for a lot of areas where client money is held. This particular area does concern me. As the Deputy rightly pointed out, there may be a gap in the regulatory environment. We will look at that because we want to ensure maximum protections are afforded to client moneys being held by any organisation. In the context of a liquidation process, the rules are very clear in terms of the action a liquidator will take in regard to preferential creditors and how that process is worked through. As I said, a court action is going on in the background.

I have asked my Department to investigate what we can do and what supports we can provide in this regard. However, I do not want to make false promises. We have committed a very significant budget over the next three years for festival events through Fáilte Ireland, which is supporting many festivals up and down the country. That will bring a huge amount of economic activity to many rural parts of our country. I absolutely am not in any way unsympathetic to the issues the Deputy has raised. I work with community groups. I am at the coalface in a rural town where exactly that activity is happening. I know how much of their time volunteers give to run festivals, particularly ones like the Rory Gallagher International Festival in Ballyshannon, Cowboys and Heroes in County Leitrim and Rockathon at Fairyhouse, that have a very significant reputation. They are all important events that contribute very substantially to their localities.

I will revert to the Deputy in the first instance in terms of regulatory gaps that may exist in relation to clients' funds. I need to go through that properly in the Department to see exactly what we can do in terms of supports. The Corporate Enforcement Authority is there. If there are any allegations, we can investigate them. However, I must be careful in terms of the High Court case that is currently under way.

The reality is that the Minister will have to come up with something in respect of these groups. Many of the festivals will not survive. Some have gone ahead or will go ahead but they are carrying huge deficits. They will go into liquidation. Some are limited companies, some are parish councils and some are community organisations. We will have a serious deficit if the Government does not invest in our festivals and does not come up with emergency funding or an emergency package. I have written to the Minister and a number of his ministerial colleagues. I ask him to intervene on the issue. It is about keeping our festivals not just this year but for next year and the years after it. There is no coming back from the blow experienced by many of these festivals. They are run by volunteer groups that have no other source of income.

The Minister mentioned a gap in legislation and regulation on this issue. In fact, it is a gaping hole. No other industry is operating in this type of cowboy country situation. If we look at a solicitor's fund or any client fund, we see it is well organised and well protected. Regulation must be brought to the House as quickly as possible to ensure the same is in place in this area.

I will revert to the House on this matter. This year, we are under significant pressure in terms of our budgetary perspective. However, we may be able, over the coming years, to look at what is needed to keep running these established festivals and how we can support them. I can commit to having a look at that in the next couple of years to see what my Department can do, together with the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, who has a lot of responsibility in this area. I appreciate that many genuinely voluntary organisations are working so hard and driving so much economic activity at the heart of their communities. Those involved are exactly the types of people the Government wants to support.