Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)
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73. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development his plans to address economic and social inequality in 2025 in urban and rural areas; the initiatives he will undertake within his Department; and if he plans to progress funding for same. [14510/25]

Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)
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My question, as is my form, is very straightforward. Will the Minister outline the plans that he has to address the economic and social inequality in 2025 in both urban and rural areas? What specific initiatives will he progress? If he could confine it to this year, I would be interested to know the scale of the ambition for the Department in terms of deliverables, KPIs and any indicators or targets that will be set.

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta as a ceist.

Working to address economic and social Inequality in urban and rural areas is a core part of the work of our Department. The Department’s budget for 2025 is €472 million. Of this, €212 million is allocated to the rural development programme, supporting our rural areas to thrive socially and economically. The funding supports a wide range of schemes that can help the rural economy and promote social inclusion. These schemes include the rural regeneration and development fund, the LEADER programme, town and village renewal agus an coiste CLÁR. The remaining €260 million is allocated to the community development area, supporting the economic and social development of communities in both rural and urban areas.

The social inclusion and community activation programme, SICAP, and the community services programme, CSP, are key programmes within the community development area. SICAP is currently Ireland’s primary social inclusion funding intervention, and is designed to help those individuals in the greatest need to access supports and to enable participation in communities. The CSP provides employment opportunities for people in disadvantaged areas, and those most distant from the labour market, while also ensuring the provision of vital community services throughout the country. Work by our Department in the areas of social enterprise and social innovation will also help address inequality in our communities. I am due to answer a question later on social enterprise in particular.

My Department works closely with local authorities, local development companies and community organisations in delivering on these social inclusion measures. My Department regularly engages with rural and urban stakeholders to identify issues. This engagement is ongoing, and we are currently developing successor policies to the Our Rural Future and Sustainable, Inclusive and Empowered Communities strategies. In the whole area of urban intervention, however, it is an area on which the Minister of State, Deputy Buttimer, and I are both focused. We want to work with Deputy O'Reilly and those across the House. It is an area on which we are spending a lot of money, but I am not convinced that we are getting the kind of returns we need. I want to progress that area a lot, not just in 2025, but during the lifetime of this Government.

Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Minister.

I do not want to be argumentative, and I am absolutely committed to working across the House to ensure that we address issues regarding inequality. While I thanked the Minister for his reply, there were no specifics in it and this is where my issue is. What we need to see is, for example, a target for the number of community centres. We all know that a community centre, a physical place where a community can come together - a bricks-and-mortar building - can be the driving force in a community in order for it to start combatting inequality within its own area. People need help, however.

Unfortunately, while the Minister's answer detailed some top-line figures, he did not give any specifics in terms of targets, such as targets for the number of community centres that will be opened or targets for how the Government will address the inequality. We know that there is massive inequality in both urban and rural Ireland. What we do not know is how the Government is going to address it. I understand the SICAP programme and the other programme, and they are working away, but is there anything specific in terms of deliverables for 2025 that the Minister has set for his Department and other organisations to deliver?

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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To give the Deputy an example regarding the community services programme, we are working with various companies around the country. We are contributing wage contribution to fund more than 2,000 positions in 430 community organisations. With regard to community centres, we have just finalised funding announcements for community centre refurbishments. That was community-led, rather than us setting a target, and that was important. We have just funded €22 million for proposals that came from across the country for specific needs and specific communities. I am worried, that if we set a target, that the communities' response will not be community-led response, whereas this has been driven from the community up regarding the specific service provided by the specific centre. We saw recently during Storm Éowyn how some centres were able to stand up. Therefore, my focus on community centre funding is how we continue to make sure they provide a specific need in the specific community.

Similarly, as we relaunch LEADER in 2025, it is community-focused and community-led. What I want to do is strengthen the structures to enable a community-led response in association with a partnership with the Department. It has to be community-led, however.

Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal West, Sinn Fein)
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This is where we might have a small disagreement, because I absolutely agree with the Minister that it has to be community-led, but setting the targets will not interfere with that in any way, shape or form. The setting of targets actually gives a focus. The Minister was not doing the communities any favours when he suggested that they could work not to a deadline or a target because they can. There is quite an amount of disillusionment with regard to the commitment that this Government has to regeneration, particularly in rural Ireland. The nature of the fabric was actually exposed during Storm Éowyn. As the Minister mentioned, some communities were able to be very resilient because they had bricks-and-mortar facilities and places to go, and others that had the bricks-and-mortar facilities were not suitable. Even if the Minister said that the target was to find those areas that could not step up during Storm Éowyn and begin with them, but failure to set a target is a mistake because by setting targets, deadlines are driven and delivery is ensured.

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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To build on the previous figures regarding SICAP, we delivered funding of approximately €51 million, which supported 2,500 community groups and 27,000 individuals in 2024. I have already spoken about the community services programme. As LEADER relaunches this year, 46,000 people have completed LEADER-funded training, which allowed 16,000 jobs to be sustained in rural areas. We provided €7.5 million to the Dublin north-east inner city, NEIC, programme, with a particular focus on it being led from within the community. We have also provided €3 million in the empowering communities programme. I want to ensure that they continue to work, and working with the Minister of State, Deputy Buttimer, we will ensure that they are focused. I am more than happy to discuss what a target might look like in that context.