John Curran
Question:981. Deputy John Curran asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the amount of funding that has been allocated to the ABC programme for 2019. [54350/18]
View answerTuesday, 15 January 2019
Questions (981, 985)
John Curran
Question:985. Deputy John Curran asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if she is considering expanding the ABC programme. [54354/18]
View answerWritten answers
I propose to take Questions Nos. 981 and 985 together.
The ABC Programme commenced in 2013 and was designed as a time-bound, co-funding agreement led by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA) in conjunction with The Atlantic Philanthropies (Atlantic), originally in the amount of 29.7m for the period 2013-2017. In late 2016, my Department secured additional funding to ensure that all 13 existing ABC sites remained in contract to the end of December 2017. As at December 2017, the total funding provided to the ABC Programme was 32.76 million (rounded). Of this, DCYA provided 17.91m and Atlantic provided 14.85m.
With the closure of The Atlantic Philanthropies operations in Ireland, DCYA is now the sole funder of the ABC Programme. In last years budget, funding was secured to maintain the existing ABC Programme up to the end of 2018.
In November 2017, my Department initiated a process, in consultation with key ABC Programme stakeholders, to consider options for sustaining the work of the ABC Programme within a new vision for a community based prevention and early intervention programme from 2019 and beyond. Following the consultations with Tusla, and other key stakeholders, including representatives of the ABC Programme managers, the decision was taken to transfer the current ABC Programme to Tusla, from September 2018. My Department is working to ensure that we take full account of the learning from all the interventions across the 13 ABC sites, and the national evaluation, in order to inform the delivery of prevention and early intervention initiatives, and to achieve our shared goal of improving the lives of children and families throughout Ireland.
A working group has been established to identify how the existing ABC Programme will transition into a new national structure that can build on the achievements to date and strengthen a future community based programme's focus on addressing child poverty and measurably improving specific outcomes for children and young people.
The transition to Tusla will include the alignment of the programme with the agencys Prevention, Partnership and Family Support (PPFS) Programme, reinforcement and enhancement of Tusla's Prevention and Early Intervention work throughout Ireland, benefitting all communities, as well as create greater opportunities for mainstreaming effective and innovative programmes and interventions. A budget of 9.5m has been secured by my Department to continue the delivery of Tusla's PPFS programme, including the ABC Programme in 2019.