Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party)
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I will try to answer all of the questions but members might let me know if I miss any of the specifics. The CSP is a bit of a hotchpotch made up of a whole variety of different types of organisations throughout the country. There are loosely three strands to the programme. The largest strand, and the one members are probably most familiar with, includes a large number of community centres and heritage sites but also some organisations, like FoodCloud, which are quite different in their function. The second strand is focused on social inclusion services. The smaller third strand is specifically about creating employment for people who are the furthest from the labour market. That is a very loose description of the three strands and there is a wide variety of organisations within the CSP. As Deputy Ó Cuív knows, the genesis of the programme was in an effort of pulling together different strands from different places. Some organisations are general social enterprises and others not so much. A lot of the work was started in the former Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment many years ago.

In the context of defining the current operation of the programme and its purpose, we asked Indecon to conduct a review of the CSP. I signed off on that report and it was published a couple of weeks ago. We are now starting a process of reforming the CSP for a variety of reasons, one of which is to ensure it fits into our five-year community and voluntary strategy. The CSP, as it has been operating, was not very strategic and it was not very clear what exactly it was for. It was, broadly speaking, about making sure that certain organisations, all of which were doing good work, got funding. The Indecon review identified a need to be more strategic about the purpose of the programme. To that end, one of the things we are likely to do is seek to tailor the funding and application processes for the different organisations and make the application process easier. That work has already started and we are setting up a consultative group, which will include managers from the CSP organisations, community centres, the Irish Local Development Network and The Wheel, to discuss how we can reform the programme. This Friday, I am meeting a number of managers from a variety of CSP organisations to ensure I stay in touch with what is happening in communities and the range of activity in this area.

I will try to address some of the specific questions that were put to me. Some 20 or 30 organisations are in the pipeline to join the CSP. One of the reasons we want to reform the programme is that there are lots of organisations that want to be included in it. The idea is that for at least some of the participating organisations, they would be in the programme for a period of time and would then move on to function as social enterprises in their own right. That has not tended to happen because of the way the scheme is currently set up. Organisations get the funding and want to hang on to it and stay in the programme. That approach is suitable for some organisations because it what they need and what we need to do for them.

There are approximately 20 or 30 in the pipeline. Currently, we have stopped new entrants because we will be restructuring next year.

As the Deputy spoke about meals on wheels, an interesting point occurred to me. Through my Department, Rethink Ireland had a €5 million social innovation fund for Covid-specific responses. As part of that, it has given a small grant to Irish Rural Link to co-ordinate meals on wheels at a national level. It is a small grant but it is a big job to co-ordinate that process at a national level but it is something that might be of interest to the Deputy as the programme was mentioned.

To respond to Deputy Paul Donnelly, our view on funding is that we contribute a portion of the salaries of people who work in the programme he mentioned. This was born out of an initial contribution some years back of what was the minimum wage. It has not increased since and the Deputy has made a fair argument that it should be increased. With regard to funding priorities, I am very concerned, like the Deputy, that some of these will not be able to stay open next year.

I can tell the Deputy in a straight and honest way that my priority in the budget negotiations was this as well. The last thing I want to do is see any of these organisations that are so crucial in what they provide to communities around the country shutting next year. It is in that context that we fought for more funding and we got €2 million specifically to help organisations like that get through next year. It will be difficult and many of these organisations depend on traded income, hall and room rental, which is just not happening now but overheads are still mounting. We had a €1 million support fund this year as well to help organisations get by.

I mentioned before that there is a bit of a natural rate of attrition as well and some organisations just do not fit the model we have. Some fall out of the scheme and some decide to leave to go in a different direct. We certainly do not want any organisations closing because of Covid-19.

I am trying to cover everything mentioned by Deputies as best I can.