Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 9 April 2019
568. Deputy Denise Mitchell asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the position regarding the implementation of the recommendations of the LGBTI+ youth strategy; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [16539/19]
View answerThe LGBTI+ National Youth Strategy 2018 - 2020 was published on June 2018 and is a world first. It is a key commitment for the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA) as part of the 2016 Programme for Partnership Government and is making a significant contribution towards the Government's broader commitment to continue to strive for the full inclusion of LGBTI+ people in Irish society.
During the Strategy development process, DCYA engaged with a wide range of Government Departments and State Agencies in order to define the actions required to realise the Strategy's goals and objectives and ensure that they were developed in alignment with other key strategies and policies. A first annual report of cross government actions will be compiled in Q3 2019.
During the first year of implementation my own Department initiated actions to meet the objectives of the Strategy, including immediate provision of new and additional youth service provision to address gaps; a mapping of current LGBTI+ youth service provision at Education and Training Board (ETB) level; funding for 39 organisations across 16 counties for LGBTI+ Capacity Building initiatives and commencing a competition for young people up to the age of 24 to design a sticker for a wide range of organisations and businesses to use to declare their support for diversity, inclusion and visible representation of public support for LGBTI+. As part of goal 3, to develop research and data environment to better understand the lives of LGBTI+ young people, a tender to commission a landscape analysis of the existing research and data relevant to the Strategy was initiated and is currently under evaluation.
