Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Jeyes for the work he has done while with the agency and for the progress that has been made. I note the budget for the coming year has been increased and this is a result of producing results over the past 12 months. I welcome the recognition of that work through the increased budget.

My main concern relates to young people who drop out of school. We seem to have fallen into a dilemma where the funding for projects that cater for children who have dropped out of school has fallen between a number of stools, between the Department of Justice and Equality, the Department of Health and Children and the Department of Education and Skills, with nobody actually taking responsibility. The issue I raised over 12 months ago has not been resolved and the centre in question is now catering for 45 young people, some of whom were referred by the school attendance officers, yet no funding is being provided. This was brought home to me when I saw the report on Oberstown this morning. The cost of providing the service to someone admitted to Oberstown is over €350,000 per annum per person.

The centre I have spoken about is keeping people out of places like Oberstown but has no funding. This is a gap in our system. If schools that have from 25 to 30 students in a class have a disruptive student and are unable to deal with that student, the student is put out of school. Often, left to swim for themselves, these students fall into the gap because while there is an agency there to look after them, that agency is not getting the appropriate and required level of funding. The agency I refer to gets funding of just €47,500 from the Department of Education. It was set up over 13 years ago, but there has been no progress made in regard to it although I have had contact with the Minister and the Departments of Education and Justice about the issue. This is not the only place in the country where this is happening, where young people who are falling out of the education system find there is no adequate system in place to deal with them. I am disappointed we have made no progress on this matter.