Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for his concern for the sector at large. The stability fund last year offered us a unique opportunity to do a kind of health check or get a good snapshot of where the community and voluntary sector was and it allowed us to support the sector. The new stability fund offers additional support in that regard. Without going into detail, I am hopeful and satisfied that, by and large, the community and voluntary sector will bounce back. Obviously, some organisations will suffer more than others but, on the whole, in terms of the applications coming in and the amount of support we will provide, I am hopeful that the sector as a whole will prove its resilience.

I will provide figures that may be of interest to the Deputy in the context of Covid supports to County Kildare. Under the Covid-19 stability scheme last year, €490,000 was disbursed to projects in Kildare, as was €66,000 under the community enhancement programme, €181,000 through the community enhancement programme for community centres under the July stimulus package, and €94,000 under the emergency fund.

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