Paul Donnelly (Dublin West, Sinn Fein)
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500. To ask the Minister for Rural and Community Development the progress made in relation to providing multi-annual funding for community, voluntary and charity sector. [38728/21]

Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael)
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In August 2019, my Department launched Sustainable, Inclusive and Empowered Communities, the strategy to support the community and voluntary sector in Ireland. This strategy was developed in consultation with the cross-sectoral group and a work plan to progress its implementation has been agreed.

Work is ongoing in respect of a number of the objectives outlined in the strategy including: a training needs assessment to identify gaps and make recommendations on how best to build capacity in the sector; a draft values and principles document has been developed with a view to it being adopted by all who engage with the community and voluntary sector; funding has been provided to support work promoting appropriate standards in training of community development practitioners; and proposals for a civic forum or national consultative event in 2021 are being examined.

Objective 4 of the strategy commits to scope and develop a sustainable funding model to support the community and voluntary sector, recognising the importance of a multi-annual funding approach.

Some of my Department's programmes already operate on a multi-annual basis, including the Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme (SICAP), the Community Services Programme (CSP), and the scheme to support national organisations in the community and voluntary sector (SSNO).

However, I recognise that many community and voluntary organisations receive funding from the State on an annual basis. My Department has commissioned Pobal to commence work on a scoping exercise for a centralised grantee database which could be a useful first step in increasing visibility across government on the funding provided by that sector.