Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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274. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the grants and funding provided to groups and organisations providing support services for women and men respectively in 2016; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29642/17]

Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael)
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My Department provides funding and grants to a large number of groups and organisations under various headings. Details can be found in the following tables of the funding given to the types of groups providing support services for women and men to which it is assumed the Deputy is referring.

In 2016, €400,000 was granted to the National Women's Council of Ireland (NWCI). The NWCI is an umbrella group representing 170 member groups as well as individual members with the aim of seeking equality between women and men. €1,385,000 was provided to the National Collective of Community based Women's Networks, which consists of 17 women's groups in various parts of the country, involved broadly in activation and outreach for disadvantaged women.

The Department of Justice and Equality also provided funding, administered by the Victims of Crime office, totalling €1.445 million for groups and organisations supporting victims of crime, both men and women, in 2016. These organisations are supporting among others, victims of domestic abuse, sexual violence, as well as tourist victims of crime, child victims, families of victims who die as a result of homicide and victims of general crime. Details of this funding is outlined in Table 1.

Table 1 - Funding provided by the Victims of Crime Office to Victim Support Services2016

COSC, the National Office for the prevention of Domestic, Sexual and Gender-based violence provided funding totalling €653,500 in 2016 to three programme organisations delivering domestic violence intervention programmes which support men and women. Details of this funding is outlined at Table 2.

Table 2: Domestic Violence Perpetrator Programmes 2016

COSC also provided funding support to Rape Crisis Network Ireland (RCNI) and the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre (DRCC) for a number of particular initiatives supporting both men and women during 2016. Details of this funding is contained in Table 3.

Table 3: Initiative funding RCNI & DRCC 2016

The Anti-Human Trafficking Unit (AHTU) provides mainstream funding to two NGOs to assist them in providing front line support services to victims of trafficking in human beings. Detailed Service Level Agreements are in place stipulating the conditions under which both NGOs receive the funding and the services for victims they are expected to carry out. In 2016 Ruhama was allocated €275,000 to support women affected by prostitution and other commercial forms of sexual exploitation. Migrant Rights Centre Ireland (MRCI) received €41,428 to work with men and women who have experienced trafficking for labour exploitation.

In addition to funding provided directly by AHTU, funding for NGOs is also provided through the Dormant Accounts Funding (DAF) Scheme. DAF funding is under the statutory function of the then Minister for Arts, Heritage, Regional, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs. In 2016, that Department allocated €200,000 for disbursal by AHTU to five NGOs for a range of initiatives with the purpose of addressing the personal, social and educational development of victims or potential victims of trafficking in human beings. In the case of four of the NGOs both men and women benefitted from DAF projects (Sexual Violence Centre Cork, Doras Luimní, MRCI and ICI) however the Ruhama initiative funded under this Scheme focused solely on female participants.

A full breakdown of all funding provided is captured in Table 4.

Table 4

Lastly, the Probation Service works in partnership with a range of community based organisations and provides funding to enable them to develop and deliver services in communities which enhance the work of the Probation Service in changing offending behaviour.

In 2016, the Probation Service provided just under €10.7 million directly to community based organisations working with adults. Most of these organisations deal with both male and female offenders. However, a number of organisations deal solely with female offenders including Tús Nua, SAOL and WRENS. Tús Nua, for example, is a specialised service established specifically to support women, who are either homeless upon their release from prison or women with an offending background and who are homeless in the community.