Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Department's activation and family support programme provides funding to assist local organisations and agencies to implement training and education initiatives to address the needs of recipients of welfare payments and their families who are distant from the labour market. The programme is demand-led and is designed to fund one-off projects in response to local customer needs, as identified by local organisations. Applications for co-funding are made to a Department employment personal adviser. Programmes covered can include pre-employment courses, literacy skills, return to education courses and personal development programmes. Payments were made to ten organisations nationally during 2022 under the activation and family support programme, with expenditure of some €222,000. In County Cork, funding was provided to two organisations in 2022 with expenditure of €59,000 to support the provision of training to some 90 people. This included funding in respect of programmes taking place in 2022 and also payment for programmes completed prior to 2022. I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.

See this speech in context