Ms Dannielle McKenna:

That was part of what I was going to say about the funding. You spend your life chasing funding. It is piecemeal funding that is put out to the youth sector. Within the UBU framework, the work cannot be done the way it needs to be done. You get some funding from the HSE, which means you cannot connect with a school or you get Pobal funding, which means you cannot provide daily school meals and after schools. We are very lucky to have more than just a youth work team in Rialto. We have after-schools, a youth service support worker and we now have a family support worker but all of those things are needed to do the work effectively. The problem is that we spend half our time fighting for funding to get what is needed to create a community-based youth work field. That is what is needed. We are doing the work. We are doing the work every day.

Our people are the community drugs workers and they go and talk to the school about why that young person is about to be suspended when all they need is a bit of support. As part of the after school, they make sure that every young person gets a hot meal through the school meals funding. They become entangled and are part of a system that is not working. UBU does not work. I know we are talking about learnings, but it is so constraining and is crippling the field to the point where we are now looking for alternatives.

Someone earlier spoke about arts funding. There is no arts funding unless we go somewhere else. Art is essential to the work that we do. We do a massive amount including art as play, art as programme and art as socially engaged practice. In order to do deep meaningful work like that, we go everywhere else except the youth work funding that is available to get that funding. That is the reality of the way it is. It is not working.