Gary Gannon (Dublin Central, Social Democrats)

I want to raise an issue I have raised on previous occasions, namely, the community I am very proud to represent, one that has its challenges but is always flourishing and has a deep history. It is a place full of strong families and deep roots, but it is a community that can often be overlooked and is struggling right now. The residents of Cabra have asked, in recognition not just of the problems but the opportunities that exist in the community, that a family resource centre be established. That is the issue I want to raise with the Minister of State.

In 2024, a group of local organisations came together to advocate for a family resource centre for Cabra. It completed a full needs analysis, backed by research from the Dublin Northwest Partnership.

They found some of the following research, information from which I will read for the Minister of State. Nearly 50% of residents in the area live in some level of disadvantage. Since 2016, there has been a 55% increase in people in the Cabra area classed as extremely disadvantaged. That is not just a statistic. That is thousands of lives at risk of falling through the cracks. When we talk about poverty or disadvantage, what we are actually talking about in many instances is what people are asked to go without. We know what factors are contributing to poverty. It is a lack of a warm coat. It is trauma that is replicated through generations and it is children being born into that environment. In Cabra West, the situation is even more urgent. Every single household in Cabra West A and B is classed as well below the average or worse with regard to deprivation. Families are facing precarious housing and isolation. Parents of kids with additional needs have a lack of safe spaces. People have to walk past visible drug dealing and there are increases in crime.

I attended the Cabra community needs launch only a few weeks ago, where a young mother of two children with additional needs described her utter desperation at a lack of services in the area for her children. One in three residents in Cabra is under the age of 30 and nearly 20% are under the age of 19, but there are next to no services for young people. Every primary school in Cabra is DEIS, and local services from youth work to school completion to sports programmes are crying out for some sort of central hub that can be a kind of space within Cabra that can start to confront the levels of deprivation and poverty. Conducting my own research using the census data, nearly a quarter of the current population of Cabra West has not gone past primary level education. There is a clear need for additional opportunities and equity in this area.

I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Smyth, for taking this matter today. I understand the Minister of State cannot commit to a family resource centre today. What we are looking for is acknowledgement, awareness and a sense of reality that potentially none of us knew about beforehand, with a sense of recognition that this should be considered and that support for a family resource centre where it is needed most. I understand completely that there will be significant levels of campaigning and lobbying. Every community will have its own stories of why it is in need of a family resource centre.

Cabra is a real traditional working-class heartland in a part of Dublin that most people know exists but probably have not really walked through. It is full of amazing families and local businesses. It has been inundated with people who have bought houses in Cabra recently and there is a real fusion of different peoples. We need an anchor point of recognition. That could be a family resource centre that can provide care for children, after-school supports and emotional-based supports for parents. Family resource centres have done amazing work. I am blessed with one of them on Hill Street. I have talked to the family resource centres around the country. Cabra could really benefit from one and I encourage the Minister of State to take this issue seriously.

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