Apologies have been received from Deputy Cairns. Deputy Sherlock hopes to join us.
Vote 40 - Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (Revised)
I thank the committee for making time available today to consider the Supplementary Estimate for the Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth Vote. The Supplementary Estimate is required in respect of a number of subheads across the Vote. Additional funding is required principally to meet the cost pressures occurring due to the extraordinary demands placed on my Department in the discharge of its role in the humanitarian response to the Ukraine crisis and in relation to its response to the exponential growth in the numbers of international protection applicants arriving in the State over the course of 2022.
The primary driver for an additional provision is the cost of accommodation for new arrivals from Ukraine. Almost 53,000 beneficiaries of temporary protection have arrived in Ireland since March, of whom 41,500 have sought accommodation. The expected full year cost in 2022 for Ukraine accommodation and related costs is €593.2 million. I remind the committee that there was no provision for Ukraine spending in the 2022 Vote for my Department as, of course, the entire crisis was unforeseen. The committee is also aware that the costs associated with the Ukraine crisis, the largest element of this Supplementary Estimate, are unprecedented. The Government has committed to continue to provide safe shelter for those fleeing the war in Ukraine. As a result these costs have to be borne by the State and, in particular, by the Department's Vote.
Other areas of the Vote are also experiencing significant pressure. The International Protection Accommodation Service, IPAS, provides accommodation and associated services to international protection applicants. This is a demand-led process and the additional funding required in 2022 is due to the cost of accommodation for the increased number of new international protection arrivals. The IPAS budget for 2022 was based on 7,244 applicants accommodated at the start of the year and an expected additional 4,500 to arrive in 2022. In fact, however, more than 10,000 people have arrived in Ireland to 25 September, more than double the numbers anticipated for the full year. As a result, the additional provision being sought for international protection is €102.9 million. These two areas respectively account for €696 million of the total Supplementary Estimate.
There are much smaller requirements for the delivery of services across a number of other areas in the Vote, including Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, and early learning and childcare as well as other smaller areas of the Department’s Vote. Tusla is expected to have an overspend of €16.2 million due to cost pressures arising on non-pay elements of its expenditure, mainly relating to the provision of residential care and costs associated with the extension of the Building Momentum agreement.
Early learning and childcare is experiencing a higher than expected uptake of both the early childhood care and education scheme and the access and inclusion model, AIM, programmes. Applications for the national childcare scheme, a relatively new scheme, have also increased beyond expectations. These factors combined result in an overspend of €27.2 million across the early years subheads.
Smaller amounts are required for other elements of the Department's Vote. The Adoption Authority of Ireland requires an additional €600,000 driven by expenditure arising in preparation for the enactment and implementation of the Birth Information and Tracing Act. The Office of Ombudsman for Children is experiencing increased pay costs and requires an additional €200,000. The Magdalen fund has a shortfall of €300,000 arising from increased claims. The Irish Youth Justice Service requires an additional €400,000 and the National Disability Authority requires an additional €100,000 to meet costs associated with the extension of Building Momentum agreement.
Savings of €35.2 million across other areas of my Department's Vote have been found to help meet the overruns. As a result, the Supplementary Estimate required for my Department is €719.4 million. I recommend the Supplementary Estimate for the Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth Vote to the committee and I am happy to address any questions members may have. As they can see I have brought pretty much the entire Department with me just in case.
I thank the Minister and I did notice that. Ironically, we are very light on numbers.
I do not often get intimidated.
No.
I do not feel intimidated now either. I apologise because I did not think I would make it to the meeting. I am watching Dáil proceedings because I am due to speak there shortly. More than anything else I want to acknowledge the work the Department has done in response to the Ukrainian crisis. It is unprecedented. We could not have planned for this situation last year before it happened. The response from the Department and from the workers in the Department has been very good. This needs to be acknowledged and I want the Minister to pass it on to the Department and anybody else delivering the response. I am happy to see that Ireland is playing its part in the humanitarian response. It is important for us as a nation to be able to roll out the welcome mat for people coming into the country, especially those with trauma and in crisis and fleeing a war situation.
Not everything is perfect and I am glad the situation in Killarney was resolved. If it has not been I would like the Minister to let me know. One of the biggest challenges we have is people coming here who have lost their homes and sometimes family members. They come over to a new situation and they find themselves in a community. After a period of time they become embedded in the community and put down roots. I was listening to the radio earlier and I heard a lady who went to college in her community but all of a sudden there was a threat of her being moved to a different community at the other end of the country. I would like to see measures in place whereby this approach cannot be taken.
There is an overspend for Tusla of €16.2 million, much of which relates to the provision of residential care. The CEO of Tusla, Mr. Bernard Gloster, appeared before the joint committee yesterday and there was discussion on what seems to be an increase in the number of children accessing bespoke temporary accommodation, such as bed and breakfast establishments, hotels, holiday chalets and so on. Does that account for any part of the increase in Tusla's expenditure?
Will the Minister elaborate on the €35.2 million in savings across certain areas, which may alleviate some of the cost overruns elsewhere? From where did those savings come? I am concerned that when savings are made, certain services that were in place might not be delivered as well as they were in the previous year.
I thank the Deputy. I very much appreciate his acknowledgement of the work the Department has done on the response to the war in Ukraine. It has been done by the staff, not by me, from the assistant secretaries, one of whom is here today, all the way to clerical officers in Citywest working to help people move around the country. Amazing work has been done by the officials in my Department, and, in addition, we have had people seconded in from other Departments and agencies. I appreciate the Deputy's recognition of the phenomenal work that is being undertaken.
Regarding the situation in Killarney, none of the Ukrainian families or individuals in that hotel will be moved from the town. They will be provided with alternative accommodation in Killarney. We have identified one hotel and are looking to find accommodation for some of the larger families that cannot be accommodated there. What happened in Killarney is an indication of the pressures and difficulties associated with having to accommodate so many people within a short period. That applies to people coming from Ukraine and also the people in the international protection process. Numbers arriving from Ukraine have more than doubled in the past month, from 700 a week at the start of September to 1,500 last week. That is very much a consequence of the renewed targeting of civilian infrastructure by Vladimir Putin.
The numbers of international protection applicants remain very high as well. As I have said on a number of occasions, we find it particularly hard to source accommodation for international protection applicants. In Killarney, we had a situation where there was a hotel that could accommodate such applicants. The reason the Department sought to move international applicants there is that, three weeks ago, as the Deputy will recall, we were not able to provide accommodation for them over a five-day period and people were being turned away. I want to avoid that situation recurring. Much as I would like to, I cannot make a guarantee that we will not have to ask people to move in the future. Sometimes, people have to move if hotels do not renew contracts. In this instance, however, there was a particular situation whereby the need to secure accommodation for international protection applicants was significant. Through working with local representatives and others, we were able to secure significant alternative accommodation.
Killarney's profile as a major tourist town made it more likely than elsewhere to have another big hotel to step in. The same may not be likely to happen in every other place. We will try to avoid situations like that. I am acutely aware that this situation would have been traumatising for families but I am also acutely aware of the need to avoid, as much as possible, a situation where we cannot offer accommodation. The Department's most basic aim is to provide accommodation and meals to people. That is the core part of our role in responding to humanitarian crises.
Regarding Tusla, the Deputy is absolutely right that the vast majority of the overspend relates to those extremely complex cases in which not only the location of accommodation must be bespoke but the support apparatus of support staff, social workers and social care staff has to be put in to deal with the particular difficulties these young people are experiencing and the range of needs they have. Sometimes, due to wider issues in terms of security, risk of flight and the like, there may have to be multiple teams supporting one individual. These are very complex cases that always fall back on Tusla because it is ultimately responsible for young people in such situations. As I am sure the Deputy is aware, Tusla has brought forward or is in the process of bringing forward a number of papers on alternative care. Mr. Gloster spoke about that yesterday and one of those reports is on residential care. Tusla is looking to strengthen the State and community and voluntary element of residential care with a view to being able to rely less on private residential care. Complex cases often end up in private residential care but the most complex cases always come back on the State and those are the cases in which very significant sums have to be invested to provide and protect these young people with particularly complex needs.
The Deputy asked about the saving of €35 million. The biggest saving was €14 million in the context of the transition from the employment wage subsidy scheme, EWSS, for early years providers. When the EWSS ended this year. Before core funding kicked in, we had a bespoke scheme in place to support childcare providers. The EWSS was originally meant to end in January. We had budgeted for the transitional scheme to go from January until the end of August. In fact, the EWSS did not stop until the end of April, which meant there was more money allocated for our scheme than was needed for the months in which it ran. That was the biggest element of saving.
The next biggest element of saving was on pay relating to posts within the Department's staff complement that we were not able to fill. There was also a saving on the response to the mother and baby and county home institutions, arising primarily from the fact the Tuam agency is only now being established, whereas we had budgeted for its establishment earlier this year. We got Government approval two weeks ago to establish it but there was a €3 million allocation for its operation this year that will not now be met.
During the summer recess - a part of the year when we all have a bit more time on our hands - we in Dublin Mid-West decided to write to all 60 schools in the constituency. We received responses from 20 of them and have met with the management in all those cases. There is a wide range of issues in schools, as the Minister knows, but I was reminded while he was speaking of one of the issues that was raised. What conversations or interactions does he have with the Department of Education around school places for either Ukrainian nationals or international protection applicants? What seems to be happening is that schools located closest to the hotels and centres where people are placed are inundated with applications. People have been walking to them and looking for places for their children. In other parts of my constituency, the schools have had no such applications. There seems to be an ad hoc kind of arrangement whereby people fleeing here from Ukraine or elsewhere and seeking international protection are having to find school places for their children themselves, without support from the Department of Education. In fairness to the people we met in the various schools, they were more than willing to help as many children as possible, if they have the resources, and do their bit in a humanitarian crisis. What engagement has the Minister had with the Department of Education on that issue?
I thank the Deputy for his question. On the higher level, when we are opening new accommodation either for Ukrainians or international protection applicants, we engage with the Department of Education and let it know people will be moving into the area in question. The Department now has a sophisticated scheme for identifying the areas in which there is pressure on school places. We engage with it on that and it can flag the issue.
The Deputy probably is focusing more on the micro level of individual schools. As part of the Ukraine response, the regional education and languages teams have been working very closely with schools to try to ensure Ukrainians are linked in with local schools. That has been working very successfully. Allocations for integration officers for this year are set out in the White Paper.
My Department has an allocation for the employment of integration officers in every local authority throughout the country. That is an area where the integration officers could provide an important link between people in international protection or Ukraine and State agencies and schools, as well as engaging with educational welfare officers and the like. We also have a budget to increase supports for NGOs in terms of the White Paper and reaching out to international protection applicants. I am very focused on education supports, knowing that probably one of the best ways to integrate children and, indeed, their parents into their new communities is to build up those linkages at schools. We will be looking to roll that out further.
Like the Deputy, I try to meet with schools in my area. A number of schools across a wide part of Dublin 15 were providing great support to students who were in emergency international protection. When that hotel was not available anymore and they moved out, the schools were looking to try to facilitate buses to continue to link people in. Schools do amazing work in terms of supporting both Ukrainians and international protection applicants. There are some bespoke measures in place from the Department of Education and we are looking to build further in terms of, particularly, the area of international protection applicants.
The Government made the important commitment to end direct provision and the situation in Ukraine and other world crises impact that. One of the biggest direct provision centres is in my area in Clondalkin. It is there a long time and the families are part of our community at this stage. They play on the local football team and go to school with my kids and other children in the area.
One of the biggest issues we have is people who have the right to remain but cannot exit direct provision. For example, people in homeless hubs will get key workers in and people to help them exit that. Do people in direct provision who have the right to remain get those housing supports and people to help them through the housing assistance payment, HAP, or homeless HAP situation, whatever it might be?
First, I recognise the amazing work the community in Clondalkin has done in terms of supporting integration and integrating with people who are in direct provision there. We provide those supports. We have a staff member from the Dublin Region Homeless Executive, DRHE, seconded to our Department who works as a key worker for people in international protection to assist them in moving on. We would be looking to increase that level of support and perhaps get more support and more people working on these cases to support people to move on. We all know the incredible pressure on the housing market right now. Obviously, someone who has status is entitled to HAP and go on the social housing list. However, we also know, particularly in terms of the housing list, the time spent is key there. The statutory supports are there in terms of finances, but there are personnel supports as well, which we are hoping to grow.
If one of the Minister’s staff members could send me on the contact details of that staff member in the DRHE, that would be very welcome. I just had a couple of people on to me in the past couple of days who are in direct provision and are struggling to find a way out. I do not know if they have had that support. When I asked them, they had not got it.
Okay. Absolutely.
I would appreciate that. I have one last issue to raise. Can the Minister open the intercultural centre in Clondalkin for me? I spoke to that employee. In fairness, I spoke South Dublin County Partnership and it indicated that it looks like it will be opening the door soon. If the Minister’s Department can put any pressure to have it open, that would very welcome as well.
Of course. Absolutely.
I just wanted to ask one or two questions. I actually have a question tabled about this tomorrow. On the domestic violence services, is there any breakdown of where exactly that is going? How will that work? The Department of Justice is supposed to be taking it all under one umbrella, which is welcome and it is good to have it in one area. The Department of Justice is probably a good fit for it. What impact will that have on the Minister’s Department? The refuges are still being funded by Tusla. Will that be the plan going forward? Is there any more information?
Out of interest, I had never seen the Magdalen fund referenced. Perhaps I just missed it before. Has there been some new interest in that? Is that partly because of all of the discussions on mother and baby institutions, redress and the Birth Information and Tracing Act? Has that brought up perhaps other things that has led people to start looking into that scheme? That is more just kind of an interest question.
As the Chair knows, the Government has made a decision to create a domestic violence agency. This will take probably about 18 months to two years to establish. Once that is done, policy but also front-line services will be directly the responsibility of that and the role Tusla currently plays in funding refuge services will move out of Tusla and to this agency fully. In the interim, because this will all fall within the Department of Justice’s remit, it is now responsible for that part of Tusla’s Vote. My Department is responsible for the vast majority of Tusla’s Vote. The education welfare service is run by the Department of Education and it gets the money for that. Now, the Department of Justice gets the money for that part of Tusla that does domestic, sexual and gender-based violence, DSGBV, response. I got a significant increase last year, but it is the Department of Justice’s role now. I am afraid I do not have the detailed figures for the Department of Justice on me right now.
That is okay.
In the short term, the Department of Justice is engaging with Tusla. In the medium term, it will actually come out of Tusla and into this new agency. The Magdalen fund was also originally in the Department of Justice. When the first transfer of functions happened in October 2020, it moved over to this Department. The Ombudsman looked at the original Magdalen scheme and made a report on that, which broadened out access to the scheme somewhat. It is primarily on the basis of more people being in contact with the Magdalen scheme and applying to it that the original estimate we had in this year’s budget has been exceeded. We are just looking to make sure we have the sufficient amount.
One of the good things, probably, in a way, if it could be called that, coming out of Covid was the increased awareness of domestic violence in all the various forms it takes. There was even much media focus and everything on it. It is good we keep awareness up and keep whatever funding we can definitively in there so that people know they have support services and everything.
Does the Minister want to make any closing remarks?
I just wish to thank the committee members for their questions.
I thank the Minister, his officials and all the staff for being here. This completes the select committee’s consideration of the Supplementary Estimates for 2022 in respect of Vote 40 – Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth and a message to this effect will now be sent to the clerk of the Dáil in accordance with Standing Orders. Is that agreed? Agreed. It is proposed to publish the opening statements on the Oireachtas website. Is that agreed? Agreed. The select committee is adjourned sine die.