Results 8,381-8,400 of 11,816 for speaker:Roderic O'Gorman

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Emergency Accommodation (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: Initial offers of accommodation were received by the International Protection Procurement Service (IPPS) for this property. Following a proposal from a potential provider, IPPS completes a detailed assessment before any property is deemed suitable as accommodation for international protection applicants or beneficiaries of temporary protection. This includes the review of information on the...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Departmental Priorities (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: Linguistic diversity in Ireland continues to grow. The 2022 census shows that there has been a 23% increase since 2016 in people usually resident in Ireland who spoke a language other than English or Irish at home . Amongst the linguistically diverse population, there are varying degrees of English language proficiency, and language barriers can be an issue when interacting with public...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Disability Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: The Access and Inclusion Model (AIM) is a model of supports designed to ensure that children with disabilities or additional needs can access the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Programme. Its goal is to empower pre-school providers to deliver an inclusive pre-school experience, ensuring that every eligible child can meaningfully participate in the ECCE Programme and reap the...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: International Protection (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: As of 31st August 2023, the International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) was accommodating 5,650 people with leave to remain status; 1,580 of whom were children.

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I propose to take Questions Nos. 549 and 550 together. Core Funding is a payment to services designed to support quality, sustainability, and enhanced public management, with associated conditions in relation to fee control and cost transparency, incorporating funding for administration and to support the employment of graduate staff. Services must uphold their contractual obligations...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: Investment in early learning and childcare is at unprecedented levels with public funding for the first time reaching more than €1 billion in 2023– a clear demonstration from Government of the value of the sector. The overwhelming majority of this funding is allocated through Together for Better, the new funding model, which comprises the ECCE programme including AIM, the NCS...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: Core Funding is a payment to providers designed to meet the combined objectives of improved affordability for parents, improved sustainability and stability for services, better supports for the employment of graduate staff, and better pay and conditions for the workforce. As of 3 October 2023, there have been 4,182 Core Funding applications received, representing more than 91% of eligible...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: The availability of high quality early learning and childcare is a key Government priority. My Department monitors early learning and childcare capacity on an ongoing basis, with a particular focus on responding to the unmet early learning and childcare needs of families. My Department engages in a broad range of research, evaluation and data projects to inform the policymaking process, as...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: The availability of high-quality early learning and childcare is a key Government priority. My Department monitors early learning and childcare capacity on an ongoing basis, with a particular focus on responding to the unmet early learning and childcare needs of families. The annual data captured by Pobal on behalf of my Department - through the Early Years Sector Profile Survey - is one...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: International Protection (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: The International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) is currently utilising two properties which previously operated as nursing homes. Negotiations are ongoing with one provider regarding a former nursing home at present. Discussions are at an early stage, and a full assessment of the property must take place, following completion of works to meet required standards, before suitability...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Disability Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: This is a matter for my cabinet colleague, the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media.

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Childcare Services (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: There is great diversity in how individual Early Learning and Care and School Age Childcare services operate. I assume the Deputy is referring to a typical ECCE-only service for the purpose of this response. These services offer only the ECCE programme, which runs for 15 hours a week and 38 weeks per year. The regulatory ratios for this provision is 11 children per staff member. With a...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Mother and Baby Homes (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I am acutely aware of the sense of urgency surrounding the establishment of the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme and I am focused on delivering the Scheme as soon as possible. To that end, a significant milestone was achieved on 11 July with the enactment of the underpinning legislation - the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme Act 2023. This Act allows for the...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth: Departmental Policies (3 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I wish to inform the Deputy that the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) does not have a policy on the use of artificial intelligence; and that no Departmental functions are assisted by language model-based chatbots (details supplied). DCEDIY is guided by the Office of the Government Chief Information Officer and by the National Cyber Security Centre...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I thank the Cathaoirleach and the committee for making time available today to consider the Supplementary Estimate for the Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth Vote. The need for a supplementary at this point occurs principally due to the expectation that the Vote will breach its total allocation before the end of October 2023. The Supplementary Estimate is being sought in...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: My Department’s response to the crisis arising from Ukraine is part of the all-of-government response. That is co-ordinated through a Cabinet sub-committee. That innovation, which took place about six months into the crisis, was hugely important in giving us a forum where all the Ministers whom the Deputy mentioned were present and the Departments of Social Protection, Education,...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I thank the Deputy. We do very extensive modelling in terms of the projected numbers of arrivals, but it is just a model and until the week is over we do not know how many will arrive. Since this has been going on for over 18 months, there are some flows we have recognised depending on the time of year. Coming up to Christmas 2022 and into this year, we had a sudden surge. In January, we...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: We will bring forward the White Paper following the budget. Elements of it are relevant to decisions taken in the budget so we made a determination to hold back until after the budget. Significant work has been done on the revised draft. We hope to be able to publish it soon after the budget. I absolutely agree with the Deputy on the system we have to use at the moment. Every European...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: Some 94,000 Ukrainians have arrived into the country and 70,000 are being directly accommodated by the State. There is always a gap between those here and those we are accommodating. At the moment, around 550 are arriving per week. That gave me the figure I spoke to earlier about 80,000 being accommodated by the end of the year. I am not sure if the figure of 110,000 the Deputy quoted...

Select Committee on Children and Youth Affairs: Estimates for Public Services 2023.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Supplementary). (4 Oct 2023)

Roderic O'Gorman: I suppose I just look at them in those two categories. The accommodated are the ones I am most concerned because of the obligation on our Department. Whichever figure it is, it is substantial. Whichever figure it is, my Department continues to work to bring on more accommodation. It is difficult and tight, which is why we are using tented accommodation. It is important to recall there...