Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I am aware of some of the groups in my own area of the south inner city. I have also had discussions with some groups in Ballyfermot and elsewhere, and this week we are hoping to meet with people from the Canals Partnership, who have expressed severe concern about the future of their community programmes and what they are delivering. They cannot plan as they do not know if the structure of the community programmes they run will be in place after April. That is one of the concerns right across the city.

Ms McCarthy mentioned Dutch, Australian and English examples. The Government has gone ahead and done the same here, it just has not been rolled out. I did a bit of research on JobPath and it is scary what private companies get up to when the incentive is profit rather than social inclusion or community gain.

I had written down a question, which Ms McCarthy answered in her presentation, about the logic behind the Department proceeding with something that is going to be out of date. That is the question for us here. The Department answered quite well by saying it is the Attorney General. We do not get the Attorney General's advice either. We can ask but it is not usually shared with us.

I do not have a large number of questions because the presentation outlines all of the failings of approaching these issues on a for-profit basis. Some of this is coming for several generations at this stage. The EU has had a change of attitude in terms of a move towards privatisation with everything being delivered by the private sector rather than the public sector. I was involved in a community development project going back before the LCDPs took full charge and shut down all the local CDPs bar the one I am still on. Is the current situation seen as a consequence of that time? I remember back then some people were saying it was the start of increasing centralisation of funding and some people resisted. Is this a culmination of that earlier change, or is it additional to it?