Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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945. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the budgetary analysis being carried out to plan for long Covid-19 impacts in her Department and each State agency under the remit of her Department in tabular form. [4493/21]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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My Department has contributed to the wider Government response to the Covid-19 pandemic in a number of ways, including; contributing to the co-ordination of the community and voluntary response; grant funding for charities, community and voluntary groups and social enterprises through the Covid Stability Fund (which was funded through the dormant accounts fund), and additional supports for community groups through the community enhancement programme to enable them to continue to function effectively in this new environment.

We will continue to ensure we proactively use our resources to ensure they are used efficiently and effectively to support the overall response, for example, this year will see €5m invested to support remote working capability, through the expansion of a hub network model into a national initiative. This is a direct response to the increase demand and need for remote working capability for all citizens. Given the remit of the Department I do not expect the impacts of long Covid-19 to be significant in terms of the work of my Department and its agencies, however, all significant developments with regard to this pandemic will continue to feed into future decisions on utilization of resources.