Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour)
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2892. To ask the Minister for Health the amount allocated to the drugs strategy to fund an organisation (details supplied) in CHO9; the number of projects and HSE services funded; the name of each project; the services and amounts received by each in 2019, 2020 and to date in 2021, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39493/21]

Frank Feighan (Sligo-Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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Drug and Alcohol Task Forces play a key role in the implementation of the national drugs strategy, Reducing Harm Supporting Recovery 2017-2015. Action 50 in the strategy seeks to improve accountability across the statutory, community and voluntary sectors and strengthen the task force model. This action will be delivered by ensuring that task forces have proper arrangements in place for the selection and renewal of the chairperson and members of the task forces and have proper procedures in place for addressing conflicts of interest.

The Department of Health has oversight of the drug and alcohol task forces and their annual allocation of over €29 million from the Exchequer. This substantial funding supports the implementation of the national drugs strategy at a community level.

It is assumed that the organisation referred to in this parliamentary question is the North Inner-City Drug and Alcohol Task Force (NIC DAFT).

The Department allocates in the region of €2.2 million per year in the NICDATF. This is provided through two channels of funding, the HSE and the City of Dublin Youth Services Board (CDYSB).

€394,896 of this funding is provided by the Department of Health and is routed through the City of Dublin Youth Services Board and €1,812,723 is routed through the HSE.

The attached table sets out allocations for the years 2019-2021 from the Department of Health.

I ask for the cooperation of all stakeholders to put in place appropriate governance procedures for the North Inner City task force to ensure effective oversight of its public funding.

The information requested in this Parliamentary Question relating to the allocation of funding by the HSE to NIC DAFT is an operational issue, and as such it is a matter for the HSE. However, members of the Oireachtas are advised that the HSE is currently unable to access the information to answer Parliamentary Questions due to the recent cyber-attack, which has required a temporary shut-down of HSE IT systems. The disruption to service is on-going, and the HSE is working hard to restore its IT capacity and resume normal services. Members of the Oireachtas will be advised as soon as the HSE is again in a position to provide responses to PQs and are encouraged to resubmit their Parliamentary Questions at that point.