I thank the Minister of State in whose constituency Ringsend and Pearse Street are located. He has responsibility for this matter and will not be unaware of what I am about to say. The city development board of Dublin Corporation, which is comprised of Government Departments, the social partners at Dublin City Hall, the six special policy commission chairpersons and the Lord Mayor as well as community representatives, is a broadly based organisation. They wrote to the principal officer, social policy unit, Department of the Taoiseach, in respect of the areas that were to be included in RAPID. I will read the text of that letter and to ask the Minister of State if it is possible at this late stage to include Ringsend, an area he and I know very well, in the area that has been extracted from the south inner city, that is, the Pearse Street area, and to have those two areas linked together for the purposes of this programme. The letter reads as follows:
We live in a time of unprecedented prosperity and progress and in a city that is in many ways booming. Yet we know that for many of our citizens poverty and social deprivation still exists. For this reason this city needs to tackle social and economic deprivation, to address social inclusion and to offer hope to communities still afflicted, in the midst of good times, with the spectre of poverty and social disadvantage, to the benefit of all our citizens and our citywide economy.
We recognize and applaud the work and commitment of communities and action groups that continue to seek to improve the reality of daily life for people in these communities, in this our city.
The Government in the Programme for Prosperity and Fairness have stated their intention to target resources and funding into 25 of the most disadvantaged communities in the nation. This targeting will involve agencies of the state and communities collaborating to maximize the impact they can make on the causes and manifestation of poverty and disadvantage within these areas. As the Development Board for the City it is our wish to see the greater integration of resources and their application to the areas of greatest need. This must happen in partnership and must seek to avail of the knowledge and experience of local voluntary, community and business groups who are committed to tackling needs within these communities. It must build upon the work already begun through the Drugs Task Forces, Integrated Area Plans, and Area Partnerships. The task of ensuring better ways to eliminate poverty and social disadvantage is best achieved by co-operation and integration of all those working to the common good.
Dublin City Development Board, conscious that Government must now identify the 25 targeted areas referred to in Section 3.6 of the PPF, declares that the objective evidence of the concentration of disadvantage and social deprivation requires that government include the following areas of Dublin city;
North Inner City
Finglas
Ballymun
South Inner City
Ringsend
Dublin North Docklands
Ballyfermot
Cherry Orchard
Crumlin
Kimmage
Inchicore/Kilmainham
Ballybough
Darndale/Priorswood
Stoneybatter
Further details on the basis of selection of these areas are contained in an appendix to the letter I have quoted. The letter continues:
The City Development Board requests the Interdepartmental Committee to include these areas on the basis of need in the list of the 25 areas to be targeted.
Will the Minister of State address the recommendation in the letter which calls for the inclusion of the south inner city areas? The area ultimately selected, the Pearse Street area, is a much narrower definition of that. The Pearse Street area is contained within the area of operation of the Dublin Docklands Development Board, as is Ringsend. While Ringsend may under some criteria not have the same level of deprivation as that of the Pearse Street area, nevertheless, deprivation still exists in accordance with the criteria laid down. To avoid a division between the two communities who qualify for consideration under the Dublin Docklands development area, on the one hand, and in some other respects, it would be socially cohesive and effective to have Ringsend linked to the Pearse Street area for the purposes of the application of the RAPID programme, which the Labour Party welcomes.