Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate on budget 2014. As Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, I welcome the measures outlined in yesterday's budget which will support families while seeking to ensure the best outcomes for children, in particular by delivering important investments to underpin real reform for children and families.

I welcome the broader economic strategy being implemented by the Government, of which strategy this budget forms a key part. This strategy will reassert our economic sovereignty by allowing Ireland to exit the bailout programme on 15 December. It is succeeding in getting people back to work, which is critical. Having lost 250,000 jobs under the previous Government – 7,000 job losses per month – we now see 3,000 new jobs being created every month. We have now seen 15 consecutive months of reductions in the number on the live register. The number on the live register will next week likely drop below 400,000 for the first time in four and a half years. This is a start. There is no question but that much more must be done but I am confident that the significant focus in yesterday's budget on job-creation measures, including the capital investment measures and the €500 million tax package of 25 measures to support SMEs and entrepreneurs, will further stimulate job creation in 2014.

Findings from the CSO SILC surveys have indicated that, in 2012, a quarter of Irish children were growing up in jobless households. More generally, it was found that children in jobless households are three times more likely to experience consistent poverty than children in the broader population. Of course they are, so getting people back to work is critical. The best way out of poverty is to have a job and that is why the creation of 3,000 jobs per month is so critical. We need far more. It is imperative for families, including children, that we continue on that path.

For those families who are working, this budget has ensured that there is no increase in income tax or the universal social charge. That is important for all families. For all families, we have ensured that there will be no cuts at all to child benefit. For all children, we have ensured that there will be no increase in class sizes and that 1,400 additional teachers will be recruited to schools next year. We have protected the universal free preschool year again this year.

We have announced the extension of free GP care to all aged five and under. This measure, while being a building block on the road to universal health care, is also about much more. It is about securing the health of our under-fives and improving the future health of the nation. The children of today are the adults of tomorrow.

As Minister, I have spoken time and again on the need for early intervention and a greater focus on those under six. We have not had that focus. This is a huge contribution to building the focus, getting in early and interrupting patterns of bad health and making a difference. We have so much to gain from early intervention in order to address the major challenges we face and the crisis in our health system and to improve literacy and numeracy, which are critical. If we want to achieve this, we must start early. If we want to disrupt the crisis of childhood obesity, which is so serious and which has lifelong consequences, we must start early. A quarter of our three year olds are overweight or obese.

Free GP care for children of five years offers a unique opportunity to make a difference to the health of the nation’s children. The implementation of free GP care for children under five demonstrates the Government's commitment to early intervention. This is early intervention in action. It is a development I very much welcome.

I welcome the plans of the Department of Social Protection to spend well over €1 billion in 2014 on work, training and education places and related supports for jobseekers. This is an increase of almost €85 million on its projected expenditure this year. It is important to note the initiatives in the budget in respect of youth-related measures that can be pursued in 2014. These include incentivising employers to offer more job opportunities to young people by reducing the threshold for JobsPlus eligibility, providing for an additional intake of 1,500 young people to the JobBridge national internship scheme and ensuring that yet another 1,000 places on the Department's Tús community work placement scheme are targeted at young people. These are real opportunities that will make a difference to young people who are finding their way back into the workforce. It gives them an opportunity to experience the world of work, get better educational opportunities and have more training. The Department of Education and Skills plans to provide a minimum of 2,000 training places for under-25s as a follow-up to the successful Momentum programme that has operated in 2013.

These measures all form part of a focused whole-of-government shift from income support to services, with a total of €46 million to be invested in youth employment initiatives across a number of Departments. These changes are about emphasising the importance of services over income support. While income support exists, so too do services. For too long there has been a focus on direct cash benefits, as I said very often in regard to the development of the child care system. We have not had a focus on developing the kind of infrastructure that is needed, be it in regard to child care or job opportunities.

Young people face a very difficult jobs market, as we all know, and need assistance in the shape of work, training and education services. An increased income support is built into each of those opportunities, and that is very important. My Department is actively engaged in preparing for the implementation of the youth guarantee.

I also emphasised during our Presidency the very important role that youth work can play in supporting youth employability. Many of our youth services are working with young people who are very often quite excluded and marginalised but the services have the contact with them and can help them to avail of work, training and education opportunities. That has been increasingly recognised. I am also very pleased that I have been able to protect the youth sector from the level of cuts that had been envisaged originally.

As Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, I welcome the 2014 Estimate for my Department which further demonstrates this Government's commitment to delivering important reforms and service developments to support Ireland's children and families. The Estimate provision will be €449 million, an increase of almost €15 million over the 2013 allocation. It consists of €414 million in current and €35 million in capital spending. This is significant when one takes into account that €9 million is allowed for in that, built in as a result of commitments made in the comprehensive review of expenditure.

We must reform our child protection services. We have had decades of reports about the challenge in this country in the context of those services and the new child and family agency is due to be established in 2014. This is a key commitment in the programme for Government and we are delivering on that. I welcome the extra provision in that area of €6 million, rising to €12 million in a full year, but I must say that there are huge pressures in this area, with the increase in population and the increase in referrals to the child protection services from the courts and elsewhere. The new agency will co-ordinate the services in a way that has not been done before.

The 2014 Estimate for the HSE child and family services is €535 million and has been adjusted to take into account the Haddington Road agreement. I have also announced the implementation of the pre-school quality agenda, which I said earlier this year was needed in this country. There is provision to hire more inspectors for the preschool sector and to develop a mentoring system so that we can invest in staff training and support. There will be opportunities for staff in this sector to undertake further training through the training fund which I have now put in place. These are all very important investments in the quality agenda for our early years services.

The other child care programmes in the Department will continue to the tune of €260 million. I will shortly be announcing projects for the new area-based approach to child poverty. This initiative was announced in budget 2013 with an allocation of €2.5 million. Now, with support from Atlantic Philanthropies, for which I am grateful, we will be able to deliver the programme in a number of areas around the country. We will have €30 million in funding to ensure that area-based initiatives can be taken to support those children and families in the most disadvantaged areas and also to ensure that we can mainstream some of the learning from the programmes that have taken place.

Budget 2014 represents an investment in real reforms for Irish children and families. It is about supporting parents and working families and ensuring that more families are working. It is also about early intervention to secure young people's health and providing opportunities for children and young people. It is about protecting children and improving preschool standards. It is also about a whole-of-Government approach, working together for Irish children and families. I thank my colleagues in the other Departments who have worked with me to ensure that we can develop this wide-ranging programme.

See this speech in context