Dáil debates

Wednesday, 5 November 2014

Topical Issue Debate

Community Development Projects

2:55 pm

Photo of Joan CollinsJoan Collins (Dublin South Central, United Left)
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I tabled this matter last Thursday week when it came to my notice. SICAP contacted me when it saw figures from Pobal. It was a major surprise and shock to people because they heard the Minister, Deputy Howlin, say there would be no cuts in this area in the next budget. I want to get clarification from the Minister that €2 million is to be taken out of this area. I hope that is not the case and that the figure is not higher. The areas affected are at the tip of their collar. Deputy Ó Snodaigh can outline the impact the cut will have on Ballyfermot Canal Community Partnership. If the cut goes ahead the equine centre serving Ballyfermot and Cherry Orchard could loose nearly €80,000 from its funding and will have to close. Is this happening? Will the Minister reverse the cuts?

There are deadlines on 13 December, as far as I am aware. On 19 December the tendering process will close for groups or partnerships working with equine centres. This will have an impact on the situation. There is a 25% cap on what can be spent on administration. The organisations concerned feel this is a major handicap, in particular in the first, second or third year of operation, and want to review that with the Minister. They say it is a deterrent to them being able to engage in the tender process, in particular in public areas. Private organisations such as British companies can do it much more easily because they are bigger and their administration costs are much lower. Is Friday, 7 November the cut-off point before which the Minister has the opportunity to reverse the cuts? People are very concerned.

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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On 16 October 2014 the Minister reiterated his and the Government's commitment to the social inclusion and community activation programme, SICAP. He lauded the scheme in terms of its ability to create opportunities, provide supports and ease the transition into meaningful employment for the harder to reach in the most disadvantaged areas in society. He announced that €46 million would be invested in 2015 to increase access to formal and informal education activities and resources and to increase people's work readiness and employment prospects. I am sure he recalls those words.

Contrary to the fair expectation that, therefore, schemes and projects in the most disadvantaged areas would be protected, we find that in the north inner city of Dublin there has been a cut of 38% in funding. In real terms that is a drop of over €500,000 for projects such as the Lourdes Youth and Community Services in Sean McDermott St., An Síol in the north-west inner city, Nascadh Community Development Project in East Wall, the Cabra Community Development Project and many more.

These cuts mean the viability of these projects is under threat.

The headline unemployment figure across the state does not really give an insight into the level of unemployment in many of these disadvantaged areas. In some areas it is as high as 70%. The Minister knows that projects, communities and individuals are dealing with a history of neglect and under-investment. These projects make a real and substantial contribution to the life of the community and the prospects of people in it. I want an explanation from the Minister as to how it is possible that a 38% cut in funding can be made to these projects in the north inner city. I appeal to him to correct this cut and reverse it if that is the decision that has been reached.

3:05 pm

Photo of Aengus Ó SnodaighAengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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Like the other Deputies, I cannot see the logic behind an announcement by the Government that austerity is over and there will be no more cuts, while the equivalent of a cut of €2 million is being made in this vital sector. Deputy McDonald outlined the effects of this in the north inner city and I know from a meeting I attended in Ballyfermot that a potential effect of the cut is the closure of one of the key projects in that area, the equine centre, while another project, the Ballyfermot partnership, will be severely hampered if not undermined. A similar effect will be seen in the Canal Communities Partnership and the Rathmines Partnership.

All of these partnerships work in areas which are deemed RAPID areas or have RAPID areas within them. These are areas of severe disadvantage which have higher than the national average unemployment. Poverty levels in these areas are sky-high and alternatives are not available to these projects to breach the funding gap now facing them. Therefore, the equine centre will lose a manager and other staff. While the Minister has set out the logic of tendering and the potential privatisation of community services, that is an ideological debate that we can have some other time.

One of the Minister's criteria for projects is that no more than 25% of the allocation should be spent on administration. However, this does not take account of the historical way in which these groups were funded. Different streams of funding were used. The criteria do not allow these projects the opportunity to phase in the changes, because if they submit a tender application by 19 December which includes anything more than 25% funding for administration, it will be ruled out straight away. They do not have an alternative source of funding so they will lose a manager. If a partnership loses a manager, that undermines the cohesion of that partnership and its ability to leverage other funding, as most partnership managers are involved in that. Will the Minister explain the logic behind this and whether there is any potential to move some of the targets and deadlines set so as to allow these groups to make alternative arrangements if possible?

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I thank the three Deputies for raising this issue.

My Department's local and community development programme, LCDP, is the largest social inclusion intervention of its kind in the State. The current programme officially ended at the end of 2013, having operated for four years with funding of €281 million over that period. It is being implemented on a transitional basis for 2014 with a budget of €47 million, pending the roll-out of the new social inclusion and community activation programme, SICAP, in April 2015. Therefore, this is a gap or interim year.

In accordance with the public spending code, legal advice and good practice internationally, and in order to ensure the optimum delivery of the services to clients, the programme is subject to a public procurement process, which is currently under way. Stage one, expression of interest, has been completed. Stage two, invitation to tender, got under way on 20 October and will involve the successful applicants from stage one being invited to apply to one or more local community development committees in local authority areas to deliver the programme. Contracts for SICAP will be determined following the outcome of this extensive procurement process.

The SICAP is one of my key priorities on the community side of the Department, and its overall indicative budget for 2015 has been maintained close to 2014 levels. The Deputies should be aware that the indicative SICAP lot budgets are based on a nine-month period from April to December 2015, as opposed to a 12-month period. This may be reflected in some calculations. The 2014 budget for LCDPs was based on a 12-month period. Therefore, we are not comparing apples with apples in some cases.

The programme’s target groups are children and families from disadvantaged areas; lone parents; members of new communities, including refugees and asylum seekers; people living in disadvantaged communities; people with disabilities; the Roma community; the unemployed, including those not on the live register; Travellers; and young unemployed people from disadvantaged areas.

In allocating resources in the prevailing stringent budgetary situation, I was particularly conscious of the need to support funding levels for the LCDP and SICAP to ensure that resources were allocated in the fairest way possible and to make the maximum contribution to job creation and economic recovery. We may debate the fairest way possible, but we thought this was the fairest way. The Department’s intention is, over time, to use our knowledge of population levels and disadvantage to ensure that available resources are targeted at areas of greatest need. The ultimate ambition is to ensure they go where they are needed most. As a tool to assist with this, a resource allocation model, RAM, has been developed. In order to achieve the objective of moving towards allocating resources according to this model, the Department has in recent years worked to ensure that those areas with the greatest needs based on the RAM are protected, where possible, from cuts and moved towards achieving a fairer share of resources because, under different models, in the past we have had arguments on the allocation of resources. In deciding on funding allocations for SICAP, the principles of the RAM model were used. Overall, the SICAP allocations were lower in some instances than those for LCDP, commensurate with the overall funding available and the demographics of each lot. In instances where the application of the RAM would have resulted in a significant reduction in the funding allocation to a particular lot, my Department modified the results to ensure that the severity of the reduction was minimised.

The RAM, underpinned by the Pobal-HAASE deprivation index, which is used in regard to allocations, allows funds to be allocated in a manner which means that a disadvantaged person in any area of the country will have equality of resources available to their area to support their needs. This is the ultimate objective and it is what we are trying to achieve.

Photo of Joan CollinsJoan Collins (Dublin South Central, United Left)
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The Minister has certainly not explained the position clearly. He says the funding for this year is for the nine months from April to December. What will happen for the three months from January to March? What funding has been allocated for that transition period? We spoke to people on the Ballyfermot and inner city projects today. They say they were never contacted or involved in discussion on this and do not know where the figures were plucked from. They are not based on any figures they handed over to the Department and they do not believe the allocations are based on factual information. They say they need the Minister to reverse the €2 million cut to the SICAP allocation. Otherwise, the equine centre in Ballyfermot will have no manager and will close.

The partnership managers who leverage funds and try to support transparency and accountability on projects will not retain their positions either if the Minister does not review the situation quickly. The administration cap of 25% of overall spend must also be reworked and a longer lead-in time must be provided to secure the level of reduction required.

There are other points about the innovative community development project. I ask the Minister to meet those involved in the projects in Dublin very soon to tease out the problems.

3:15 pm

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister read out all of the target groups involved, including children, lone parents, new communities, the unemployed, including the long-term unemployed, and every category he recited is box-ticked for the inner city of Dublin. I am very puzzled by this resource allocation model and how it functions because I cannot for the life of me figure out how such a model could be used to come to the conclusion that a 38% cut is viable, appropriate or merited in the case of the inner city. By the way, the 38% figure takes account of the nine month as opposed to the 12 month allocation and the figure still comes out as 38%. Does the Minister stand over this figure? I take him at his word when he talks about social inclusion and targeting the most disadvantaged. I can tell him that in the inner city of Dublin he will find communities and populations that are, unquestionably, among the most disadvantaged by comparison with anywhere else across the State. We must also bear in mind that, in the absence of a local development company, because the partnership was dismantled and has never been replaced, 15 inner city groups have come together as the Dublin Inner City Community Alliance. If the Minister was to meet them, rather than take my word for it, he would hear at first hand about the devastation this cut is going to cause. Will he meet them? Does he stand over this resource allocation model? He needs to go back and look at it, as there is no way - not a chance - this could merit a 38% cut in the inner city. I ask him to at least agree to meet this group.

Photo of Aengus Ó SnodaighAengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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The Minister made the point that it was for nine months. In the document I have before me we have annualised the figures and the figures I quoted to the Minister still show a 23% reduction in the case of Ballyfermot. This is the smallest of the allocations, but it is the equivalent of a cut of €163,191. In the case of the canal community and Rathmines partnership, it is the equivalent of a cut of €198,967. These figures are easily obtained and, while figures can often cloud the issue, I can give others for the equine centre or any of the groups dependent on the partnerships.

These cuts come on top of others. For example, in the equine centre which potentially could lose its manager there have been six redundancies since 2008. It cannot sustain that level of cuts and will collapse. It is a centre that caters for over 500 children a week and has move young people from deprivation to employment, which is its purpose. It offers FETAC level 3 and 4 courses and is considering offering level 5 course for some of the children who in many cases do not have alternatives. That is the consequence of the cuts. I, therefore, urge the Minister to look again at this issue in the few short weeks available. He should seek to change the timeframe and the criteria used. In particular, he should look at the 25% figure for administration costs in the context of historical funding, not forever more but in recognition of the fact that there are different funding models and that these groups cannot change overnight, as they are expected to do. The announcement was made on 20 October, yet they are expected to submit a tender document by 19 December.

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I know that the Deputies are raising this issue in the right spirit, which I appreciate. On Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh's last comment, the issue has been well flagged for a good period. On the point about the period of three months, to answer the question directly, the previous funding model applied for three months, which is the reason for having a period of nine months.

With regard to the resource allocation model, RAM, which uses the HAASE deprivation model index, I will make it available to the Deputies as that is the easiest way for them to scrutinise it, like anybody else. That is the fairest and most appropriate thing to do.

The key point is that, under this model, there will be change. The targeting is apolitical and not something that involves political allocations or anything like it. The allocations are assessed. It is an attempt to target the most deprived areas and ensure we have a balance between areas where other resources are available in order that we can intercept appropriately. It is done as fairly as possible, based on high quality, scientific data and is equitable. It deals with population and deprivation indexes across a range of analyses and data. It is important to acknowledge that, if funding was not going to other areas, the Deputies opposite would be asking why it was not going to them. It is the case in one scenario as it is in another. We have to be as fair as possible. We have to ensure the funding goes to the appropriate areas where other resources are available which can be intercepted to get them to where the real problems are.

If the group involved sees fit to write to me, I will ensure it receives a fair hearing as a group

Photo of Mary Lou McDonaldMary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein)
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Will the Minister meet it?

Photo of Alan KellyAlan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I will ensure it receives a fair hearing as a group. That is a direct statement.