John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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744. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the reason Youthreach services are excluded from qualifying for the school meals grant. [48316/25]

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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The objective of the School Meals Programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement.

All primary schools are currently eligible for the Hot Schools Meals Scheme. Under the Programme for Government, I plan to commence the rollout of Hot School Meals to secondary schools over the lifetime of this Government.

Prior to the introduction of DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools) in 2005, the Department of Education decided - based on levels of concentrated disadvantage - which organisations would benefit from the Programme. As a result, there are 14 Youthreach Centres in the School Meals Programme. These organisations have continued to remain in the programme with the same level of funding year on year.

Policy has changed over time and I now understand that Youthreach participants receive a weekly training allowance, a meal allowance, and a travel allowance if applicable from their relevant Youthreach centre. These supports are not funded by my department.