Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 2 Feb 1999

Vol. 499 No. 3

Written Answers - Children and Family Policy.

Róisín Shortall

Question:

281 Ms Shortall asked the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs the areas of responsibility, if any, his Department has with regard to the Government's policy on children; the areas of responsibility, if any, his Department has with regard to the Government's policy on the family; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2743/99]

Minister for Social Community and Family Affairs (Mr. D. Ahern):

The Government programme An Action Programme for the Millennium contains a range of commitments in relation to the family and children. The primary responsibility of my Department relates to income support for families and children. The recent budget made provision for a package amounting to £305.5 million in a full year. As part of this package, £40 million provided for improvements in child benefit: family income supplement was improved by £4 million, including an increase of £8 in the weekly thresholds from June 1999 and the carers allowance was boosted by £18 million on top of the existing £45 million.

My Department has significant and substantial responsibilities for the Government's social inclusion commitments, income support arrangements for families, services for lone parents, support for the community development programme and for the community and voluntary sector generally and for the development of family policy. In this context, the Department has particular responsibility fo the Government commitment to adopt a "families first" approach by putting the family at the centre of all its policies in the context of developing coherent progressive and effective policies for families as promised in the programme for Government, An Action Programme for the Millennium.

In line with its pro-family approach to the development of policy and services and in response to recommendations from the Commission on the Family the Government has established a family affairs unit in the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs. The functions of the family affairs unit are; to co-ordinate family policy, to pursue the findings in the report of the Commission on the Family (published July 1998) following their consideration by the Government; to undertake research; and to promote awareness about family issues.

The unit has responsibility for support for the marriage counselling services and the Family Mediation Service as well as a number of other family services including a pilot programme to provide improved service to families from local offices of the Department through the one-stop-shop model, and the introduction of an information programme on parenting issues.

This year £6.5 million has been allocated specifically for the development of family services. This includes:

–£2.1 million for marriage and child counselling and bereavement counselling and support. It is expected that over 250 groups providing these services will receive grants this year. An allocation of £60,000 is being made this year to Rainbows programmes which provide a very special type of support to children who experience the loss of a parent, through death or separation.

–An extra £200,000 for the continued development of the Family Mediation Service. The framework for the nation-wide service as promised in An Action Programme for the Millennium is now in place. The Family Mediation Service is now providing services from regional centres in Cork, Tralee, Wexford, Athlone, Dundalk and Galway in addition to those in Dublin and Limerick. The allocation in 1999 will consolidate the services in place and allow for further expansion to other areas of the country including the north west.

–An extra £1 million for the Family and Community Services Resource Centre Programme will allow an additional 15 to 20 centres to be initiated in 1999. By the end of this year some 50 centres will be funded under the programme, under which ten centres were being funded at the beginning of 1998. A number of these centres provide crèche facilities while parents are participating in the activities of the centre.

–An allocation of £200,000 has been provided in the budget under the community development and family and community services resource centre programmes to support local initiatives for the development of out of school hours services.

The out of school hours service provides opportunities to enhance support for children in disadvantaged communities who do not have many opportunities for learning and recreation and who may be unoccupied outside school hours.

Resources have been allocated for the development of a number of initiatives by the Family Affairs Unit in 1999 including undertaking research, a pilot programme in relation to the local offices of the Department building on the one-stop-shop concept with the aim of providing improved support at local level to families and the introduction of an information programme on parenting issues.