Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Thank you. I love to hear the call of the Seanad each morning, and I am delighted to come here to address and respond to the issue raised by Senator Buttimer, a very special colleague whose legacy on marriage equality hit the shores of Australia last night, so I congratulate him.

To the matter at hand, the Togher family centre operates as an independent organisation and is governed by a board of management that is representative of the local community. As Senator Buttimer noted, I have had the opportunity to meet the staff. I acknowledge that it is a voluntary, community-based service located in the heart of Deanrock Estate, Togher, Cork city, and it provides a range of services, including early years education; integrated support and early identification of need; family support services; family access services; adult education; and early intervention youth work.

It was not immediately clear from the question if the Senator had a particular service in mind, although it may be clear in light of his contribution this morning. The centre receives funding from my Department under the early childhood care and education, ECCE, scheme and the community childcare subvention, CCS, scheme. Funding to Togher family centre under both schemes to date in 2017 comes to a total of just over €295,000. In 2017, funding of more than €30,000 was also provided by my Department, through the Cork Education and Training Board, for the Togher youth resilience project, which is based in Togher family centre. Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, has advised that it provided funding of approximately €144,000 to the centre this year. An additional €26,000 was also provided by Tusla to the centre in recent months, bringing the total funding allocation to more than €170,000 in 2017. This is an increase of almost €33,000 over 2016. I understand the centre also receives funding from the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection under the school meals programme, and from various other sources.

The Togher family centre provides a service in line with the principles of Tusla’s prevention, partnership and family support programme. The main focus of services is on early intervention to promote and protect the health and well-being of children, young people and their families. The centre, as the Senator has referred to, has also developed an access centre which provides services to children in care and their families. This provides a safe, neutral and child-focused setting for children to visit with their non-custodial parent. All visits and exchanges take place under the supervision of trained staff. Togher family centre can arrange for supervised access through referrals from Tusla. Supported or fully supervised access is also offered depending on the needs of the particular family.

I understand that in recent times the access centre has experienced considerable demand from the family law courts, guardians ad litemand other parties, and has provided, where possible, supervised access for referrals from these parties. It is important to reiterate that the core work of the centre is focused on referrals from Tusla, and it is not always possible for the access centre to satisfy the increased demand from other sources. I say this while being cognisant of the emails Senator Buttimer shared with us this morning.

My Department has also received an application from the centre for community employment sustainability funding in the early years sector. Financial reserves were identified in that process, and my officials requested clarification on the use of these reserves and their relevance to child care funding. Following a response from the centre, the position is under review, and my officials will revert to the centre in due course. In situations such as this, decisions with regard to future funding levels for individual service providers are informed by the business case put forward by the provider in question and an assessment of service need in the locality in question undertaken by the relevant funding authorities. It is important that this process is undertaken and completed in order to allow for an informed assessment to be made on the funding issue raised, having regard to the available resources and competing priorities.