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

I have a couple of comments and, perhaps, a couple of questions as I go along. I am from Clondalkin which, as the Minister will be aware, has a big direct provision centre. While we have advocated and pushed for years to move away from people not having their own door in the area, this still brings up fears within the community in the direct provision centre that because of this policy, they may be moved outside an area into which they have assimilated well. They are involved in the local schools. Some of the residents work and are involved in local clubs, including my own local club in Clondalkin.

Is there any policy in this regard? Is there anything to relieve those fears that if they move to an own-door direct provision centre, all efforts will be made to ensure they are kept within the area in which they are comfortable? They have made a home for themselves and have assimilated well within the community in Clondalkin.

I wish to bring up another issue. I am not sure if it falls into the Minister's remit but it crosses between justice, education and integration. As the Minister mentioned, one of the biggest aids for people to assimilate and integrate when they first come into the country is to get young people into school as soon as possible. We are coming up with a blockage. I only became aware of this yesterday and sent off a couple of parliamentary questions regarding personal public service numbers, PPSN, for new people coming into the country. There seems to be a delay in the Department giving out PPSNs. Some of the schools say they are a mandatory requirement for them to process the school application. It is a blockage. Will the Minister bring that issue up with the relevant Minister or does he have an answer? Is there any way we can make this process a little bit easier for people who are coming into the country?

I will raise an old issue about people who have gone through the process and received their stamp 4 permission but who are still in direct provision because of the lack of housing. Will anything within these Estimates provide extra resources for people to move out of direct provision and into their own homes?

The Minister mentioned the added pressures of Covid-19 in direct provision, especially around communal living, kitchen, laundry and play spaces and so on. I thought I would mention that.

I will finish by picking up a point raised by Deputy Costello, which I have mentioned previously. I have worked in care planning and have held managerial positions within the community, especially in the role of addiction when I worked with addiction services. We were given care planning and logic models to fill out, which were all box-ticking exercises to prove the work we did was necessary in order to get the funding needed to keep the service going. They ended up as box-ticking exercises. To follow up on what Deputy Costello said, a care plan is needed and someone needs to be in charge of it. Real and tangible outcomes are needed at the end of these care plans so they do not end up as just box-ticking exercises. Those are just a few comments and statements.