Ruairí Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister's remarks. As regards Tusla, there are certain families that are incredibly frightened when they hear Tusla mentioned, which can create its own difficulties. However, there are specific issues which I will discuss later with the Minister relating to the interactions with some of these groups. We do not necessarily have it across the line in the context of meitheal or how exactly the process will work for some of these groups.

One of their asks will be to expand the sponsorship, particularly in the context of the Department of Education. Many referrals were made by home-school liaison teams and the school completion projects that were operating in DEIS areas and those are specific areas at which we can look. I have spoken to the Minister before about the fact that as much as we see the absolute necessity of the NCS in terms of job activation and, in particular, those at the lower end, but there are specific needs of disadvantaged families and children that need to be considered.

We might need to look at a separate pot of funding. I hope the review process will deal with that.

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