Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 20 January 2015
571. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government his plans regarding the 2015 funding for an organisation (details supplied); and if he will arrange to meet with these two national networks as a matter of urgency to discuss their future funding arrangements. [2779/15]
View answerMy Department’s Local and Community Development Programme (LCDP) is the largest social inclusion intervention of its kind in the State. The current Programme officially ended at the end of 2013 having operated for four years with funding of €281 million over that period. It is being implemented on a transitional basis until March 2015, pending the roll out of the new Social Inclusion and Community Activation Programme (SICAP) in April 2015. In accordance with the Public Spending Code, legal advice, good practice internationally and in order to ensure the optimum delivery of services to clients, SICAP is subject to a public procurement process, which is currently underway.
The public procurement process is a competitive process that is open to Local Development Companies, other not-for-profit community groups, commercial firms and national organisations that can provide the services to be tendered for to deliver the new Programme. In Stage one, joint applications were encouraged and organisations of varying sizes (for example smaller organisations working in consortia with larger organisations) were invited to submit joint applications. That said, I understand that some small groups, such as the groups under the remit of the National Collective of Community Based Networks (NCCWN) and the National Traveller Partnership (NTP), faced a number of challenges in competing in the Stage one process. The results of Stage one were released on 24 September 2014 and I can confirm that none of the NCCWN groups expressed an interest either as lead applicants or as part of a consortium. I am now considering the implications of that for NCCWN and my Department is liaising with other relevant Departments to find a workable solution. My Department will be arranging a meeting with the NCCWN shortly.
With regard to NTP, the majority of its affiliated groups did express an interest at stage one, as part of consortia. The outcome of the SICAP procurement process will be known next month.
Separate to, and outside of SICAP, discussions with the Department of Justice and Equality are nearing conclusion to design a Traveller support scheme based on, inter alia, Traveller Inter Agency projects and supports.
I can confirm that interim LCDP funding, based on a small budgetary reduction in the order of 6.5%, on 2014 levels, will be provided to NCCWN and NTP up to end March 2015.
