Parliamentary Question addressed to the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government

To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government to clarify the issues surrounding the withdrawal of funding for the community development posts in: St Michael’s Estate, Dublin 8, Dolphin House, Dublin 8 and Fatima Mansions, Dublin 8 and if she will make a statement on the matter?

Repy

As part of the Government’s Comprehensive Review of Expenditure and the 2012 Estimates process difficult decisions have had to be taken in relation to prioritising funding for core services in all programme areas. The funding Estimate to support my Department’s mainstreamed drugs projects under the housing programme is €100,000 in 2012, compared with €400,000 in 2011, and as the part-time posts in question form part of a mainstreamed drugs project my Department will not be in a position to continue to provide funding towards these posts.
The project manager has been advised that my Department will be happy to facilitate and engage in a partnership consultation process with the project in question, along with the Local Drugs Taskforce, the Department of Health, the HSE and Dublin City Council, with a view to identifying alternative funding mechanisms for the project for 2012 and beyond. While this consultation process is taking place, my Department has agreed to provide pro rata funding of €15,200 for the first quarter of 2012 only, as a final housing budget contribution towards the project. It will be a matter for the other public funding bodies, as part of the consultation process, to identify resources to deliver on the overall objectives of the reconfigured project beyond end March 2012.
More broadly, and in the context of the public funding provision of €260 million for drugs programmes across all Departments and agencies in 2011, my colleague the Minister of State with responsibility for the National Drugs Strategy is currently undertaking a review of the structures that underpin the National Drugs Strategy at local, regional and national level, including how the current funding structures can be improved or streamlined, particularly in relation to local and regional drugs task forces.