Tony Gregory (Dublin Central, Independent)

I accept that funding is being provided for this year and, hopefully, next year from the community development unit of the Department. Is it intended, all going well, that the community development unit will continue to fund this project on an ongoing basis? I ask in the context of the fact that, since its inception in 1995, the project was funded first by the Department of Social Welfare, then the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform and now the Department of Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. There is a great deal of frustration with such projects that no one Department appears to take responsibility for after-school projects. Does the Minister of State accept that the recent OECD report severely criticised this country regarding early childhood education and specifically the need to provide after-school activities for children in severely disadvantaged areas? Here we have a group which has spent years of frustrated effort and energy in trying to locate a source of ongoing funding to provide such a service. The OECD report stated it was one of the strengths of the Irish system that it had voluntary and community groups carrying out this type of work.

Will the Minister clarify the position regarding funding from the community development unit? Is it intended to provide this on an ongoing basis? What can be done to mainstream groups providing after-school services in the absence of anything else for children in extremely disadvantaged areas in the north inner city? That part of the north inner city, as the Minister is well aware, is a byword for inequality and lack of access to second and third level education.

There was a question earlier about drugs and children who end up using drugs. Services and community projects such as the one under discussion steer young children away from drugs and give them a chance to get through second level and into third level education. Does the Minister accept it is of vital importance to disadvantaged areas that projects such as these are given a permanent source of funding for the very badly needed after-school activities they provide?

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