Mark Ward (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

All politics is local and this is, to some extent, a local issue for me. I represent the Dublin Mid-West constituency and grew up in north Clondalkin. As the representatives of Jigsaw know, that is where the service was first located. It was borne out of a need for intervention after a spate of youth suicides in my area. Many of those children were the sons or daughters of friends and neighbours of mine. Jigsaw decided to restructure, move out of the area and go from providing a five-day comprehensive service within our community to a proposed one or two-day satellite service. I was part of a very strong campaign to retain the service in north Clondalkin. The campaign is a testament to the work of Jigsaw in north Clondalkin. The community rallied around to keep the service there because of the vital work it was doing in our area. With the onset of Covid, many residents and others in the greater Clondalkin area are a little in the dark regarding the current status of the service that is available. What will the new service look like? When will it be operational? Where it will be located?