Paul Donnelly (Dublin West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Ms O'Brien and Mr. Saunders. I have just a couple of questions. They have covered some of the issues that I wanted to raise so I will not go over them again.

I will make a quick comment on the digital poverty piece. It is something I found interesting over the course of the past year and a bit. Also, I have worked in areas of educational disadvantage where I saw it at first hand. Even this week, I met with the parents of children with dyslexia who must apply to the Department for tablets or laptops and yet, ironically, during the Covid pandemic, third level students were automatically given laptops and tablets. It is interesting that we have children who I have seen at 13, 14 or 15 years of age dropping out of school who eventually will end up engaging with services such as the LES and Tús. It is like closing the door after the horse has bolted. If we can close the gap in terms of digital poverty as we go forward, particularly with young people, it will make a massive difference to their lives.

In the context of the LES, my question relates to something I have spoken about at length previously. The concern I would have, having read the submission, relates to whether our guests are asking for existing services to be in some way red-circled or are they saying that the new services that will be put in place in those areas that do not have a LES will be the new model which is being proposed by the Department of Social Protection. Obviously, my preferred option would be that this is not-for-profit and no for-profit organisations would every get their hands on it. I would always fear - this goes back to industrial relations - that if you red-circle employees, then invariably down the line those red circles eventually become a target. The services that are being provided for profit can operate on different wages and conditions for staff, different operating conditions, etc., and all of a sudden you have maybe 14 or 15 LES operators for profit who are operating a completely different system. The pressure comes on then if you are paying decent wage, if you have good conditions for your workers and if you are also providing a good service.

Another issue I have relates to the community development projects. At the time I was involved in community development projects, we had locally managed community development projects which were in the community. I note that there are a number of pilot projects. In the context of the local development companies, SICAP funding and community development projects, I would have a concern about how representative it is in disadvantaged working-class areas and how a community can decide for itself where that funding goes. I would have a huge concern that it is becoming very much a top-down as opposed to bottom-up approach to funding for disadvantaged areas.

Then there is the last piece around the food banks. In my opinion, food banks are fundamental evident of failure in society to provide a decent income for people and they are something that we should be always working to get rid of. It is not something that should become endemic or that could be a core piece of work for any organisation because if we provided people with a decent income, they would not have to access food banks, food clouds, etc. I understand the concept behind them. I understand that they are what is needed at the moment and that many families rely on them. We should be looking to do ourselves our of jobs in terms of poverty, digital poverty, food poverty, etc. I will leave it at that.