Emer Currie (Fine Gael)
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I welcome the Minister of State. We have a very strong track record with regard to the youth justice strategy and youth diversion projects. They make absolute sense. It is proven that people are more likely to take risks when they are younger and more likely to want to please their peers. Neurologically that is proven. When they get older that likelihood drops steeply. We want to avoid detention as much as possible. However, the figures show that those between 18 and 24 years are disproportionately represented in prisons. They account for 20% of the prison population compared with 9% of the general population.

There is widespread support for extending youth diversion projects to 24-year-olds. In Blanchardstown, Foróige offers services to all groups in our youth work strategy from eight to 24 years, including family support. Those services are brilliant and the youth workers we have in Dublin west are incredible. However, we also want the public to have confidence in our youth justice strategy. From knocking on doors and being on the ground, I can say there is concern about lower level youth crime, persistent anti-social behaviour and a perceived lack of consequences for youth offenders. That is across the board in Dublin west.

Youth workers have told me they have never felt more under pressure. I have looked at the figures and they concern me. In the past five years, funding for our 23 Dublin Garda youth diversion projects has increased by a massive 143% but the number of participants has only increased by 11%. Funding stood at €5.18 million in 2019 and that increased to €12.6 million in 2023. The number of participants has increased from 1,092 in 2019 to 1,212 in 2023. Those are figures I received from the Department of Justice. Questions arise regarding value for money where there is spiralling funding but a diminishing return.

With my critical hat on, I ask if youth diversion projects are integrated sufficiently into wider community safety plans and universal youth services. As far as I am concerned, youth diversion projects and programmes alone cannot drive a youth justice strategy. We need community-wide involvement along with services and facilities. We also need funding for universal youth services. It concerns me that while we have seen this increase in targeted services, conversely funding for universal youth services has remained stagnant since 2008. When it comes to youth services, it should not be the case that intervention comes at a point where there is a risk of criminal behaviour. We need youth services to have touch points across the board with our young people. That means having an integrated youth services landscape.

I ask the Minister to take a critical eye and think about public confidence, value for money and the youth sector in general.

Malcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party)
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I thank the Senator. This is a really important question on an area I worked in previously and in which I have some experience. On behalf of the Minister for Justice, Deputy Helen McEntee, and the Minister of State, Deputy James Browne, I thank the Senator for raising this matter.

Our approach to youth justice in Ireland is that children who come into contact with the criminal justice system are still children. Youth diversion projects, YDPs, are community-based, youth crime prevention initiatives which seek to divert young people who have been or are at risk of becoming, involved in anti-social and-or criminal behaviour.

A top priority for the Department of Justice is the expansion and deepening of the services offered to young people by the YDPs, which are fully funded by the Department. On average, the YDPs engage with about 4,000 young people across the State in any one year. Last year, the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, published the first evaluation report of the YDPs to help further our understanding of the structure, conduct and impacts of our youth diversion projects.

The report noted the very positive work ongoing in the YDPs already, including strong governance and high levels of engagement from participants and their families. Several areas for improvement were also identified, including better availability of YDPs at weekends and maximising the use of administrative data and other research to inform service development. It is clear that the positive impacts of YDPs are being felt by participants, families and the wider community. The evaluation identified decreasing risk levels among participants in respect of peer relations, leisure and recreation, personality and behaviour, and attitudes and orientation.

The Minister for Justice is committed to ensuring that every young person in the State who needs these services has access to them. Considerable work is being done to expand our network of YDPs to achieve full nationwide coverage.This includes the establishment of a number of new youth diversion projects, as well as expanding the catchment area of existing projects. The Senator mentioned the uplift in recent budgets. That is most welcome. In budget 2024, the funding allocated to overall youth justice services increased by 10% to €33 million. This is facilitating an increase in the availability of YDP services in the evenings and at the weekends when many young people need them the most. It is also to provide for an increase in supports for families, hard-to-reach young people and early interventions for eight to 11-year-olds who may be at increased risk of engaging in criminal activity. We have seen, in line with the increases in youth justice funding in recent years, a similar increase in the number of YDP participants each year since 2021. Last year, 4,251 young people participated in YDP projects. As well as being the right thing to do, it is worth noting that every cent invested in our youth diversion projects will pay back in the long run. In 2024, we spent approximately €6,773 per young person participating in the YDPs. The annual cost of sending someone to prison in 2022 was over €84,000. The annual cost of detaining a child in Oberstown is over half a million euro.

The work of YDPs benefits everybody in our communities promoting pro-social activities and outcomes for young people at risk of lives of criminality. The youth diversion projects not only divert young people away from crime, they work to foster young people's talents and interest in personal development. These projects provide an essential resource to support the work of An Garda Síochána in addressing youth crime and protecting local communities. I note the Senator's stark points in terms of the uplift of the budget versus the slower rate of uptake in the YDPs themselves. The Senator has a point in respect of the capacity of universal youth services to be able to deliver. That is something I had a conversation with Ossory Youth in Kilkenny about recently. With regard to the administration and staffing of youth services generally, there is a challenge there that we need to look at in budget 2025 about the broader interaction of youth diversion projects within the universal youth services that are provided. That is something about which I will speak to the Ministers, Deputies McEntee and O'Gorman, and the Minister of State, Deputy Browne. There is a bigger challenge there about the integration element and ensuring that there are pathways for young people out of Garda youth diversion and into other youth services to help them on their onward journeys and paths. That is hugely important. There is a challenge around youth services generally in the country, given the increased demand they have and the services they provide.

Emer Currie (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister of State and appreciate him agreeing with me that these figures are worrying. They are startling. I completely support youth diversion programmes, the work of expanding them and measures on the ground in terms of access at the weekends, the strategies with hard-to-reach children and the widening of the age eligibility. We have a question to answer around how that funding is being used. Based on my figures in Dublin, it has gone from €4,700 per participant in 2019 to over €10,000 in 2023. It cannot just be about the services at this level, UBU or the youth diversion projects. It has to be with a holistic view. There is a role of here for local community safety partnerships and better integration of youth workers with the wider community. That is going to be really important. There have to be enough youth facilities and services for young people. I benefited from youth work when I was younger. Having that volunteer ethos, having youth workers that are a part of a community is invaluable. Their work is invaluable. We need to see increased funding in universal youth services also.

Malcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party)
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I agree with everything the Senator is saying. The Minister of State, Deputy Browne, has been proactive in terms of addressing issues such as looking at a review of YDPs. Generally, the uplift in funding has been welcomed but those figures presented by the Senator are significant. I note that the Department of Justice is partnered with the University of Limerick on a trial approach. The implementation of a joint commissioning approach to a no-wrong-door approach to a youth justice strategy to address the situations of young people with really complex needs is to be most welcomed. We will take on board the points the Senator is making about the wider integration of youth services, the role that the local community safety partnerships could have in a wider sphere, as well as the general issue of capacity of youth services to deliver. I do not just mean YDPs but a much more broad and complex set of services to young people, including mental health, well-being and all of these services. There is increasing demand for these services with increasing numbers of young people. Is the question of capacity to deliver among youth services generally the nub of what the Senator getting at this morning?

Aisling Dolan (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, for taking so many of our Commencement matters this morning.