Paul Lawless (Mayo, Aontú)
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1955. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the reason no payments have been made from the scheme announced to support children with disabilities, despite the Government's commitment to address these critical needs, particularly given 41,000 children are still waiting for an assessment of needs; and the immediate steps being taken to ensure that funds are distributed without further delay. [15187/25]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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In October 2023, the HSE, in conjunction with my Department, launched an open call for applications for the Children’s Disability Service Grant Fund. The Children’s Disability Service Grant Fund is an initiative detailed under action 2.7 of the Roadmap for Service Improvement 2023-2026, Disability Services for Children and Young People.

Applications for funding were open to:

• Organisations with an existing service arrangement or grant agreement with the HSE
• Community groups
• Voluntary groups
• Private service providers

Due to the volume of applications and the additional administrative work involved in co-ordinating and collating the proposals, the HSE had to revise the anticipated time-frame for the assessment process and the award of funding to successful proposals.

On 5th June 2024, the HSE confirmed that a total of 52 projects had been chosen to receive funding under the Grant Fund, with a number of the larger projects to be funded over a three-year cycle. The total estimated cost of funding all 52 projects is €7.97m.

It was confirmed on March 25th 2025 that my Department had secured sanction for the Grant Fund, with funding allocated from the €3.2 billion disability services budget. There is a target date for commencing the projects mid-year and many of them are due to be completed to the end of 2027. The HSE will engage with successful applicants around the drawdown of funding and the financial and governance requirements in relation to the delivery of projects.