Disability Activation Projects

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 24 May 2016

Tuesday, 24 May 2016

Ceisteanna (301, 330)

John Brady

Ceist:

301. Deputy John Brady asked the Minister for Social Protection the cost of securing and replicating the WALK PEER programme for 2017 in tabular form. [11509/16]

Joan Collins

Ceist:

330. Deputy Joan Collins asked the Minister for Social Protection to continue funding to the WALK PEER programme under the disability activation project to ensure the programme remains in place, given that it ceases on 30 July 2016 and that the cost of continuing it is €280,000 per year. [11791/16]

Freagraí scríofa

Minister for Social Protection

I propose to take Questions Nos. 301 and 330 together.

The Providing Equal Employment Routes (PEER) project was one of 14 disability activation projects (DACT), in the Border, Midlands and West region, which were jointly funded by the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Department of Social Protection (DSP), from the end of 2012 to April 2015. The project was delivered by the Walkinstown Association for People with an Intellectual Disability (WALK).

A key criterion applied when selecting projects was that the learning from this activity should be capable, where appropriate, of being mainstreamed in the future. Therefore, it is important to note that the projects were never intended to become ongoing service delivery organisations in their own right, no matter how successful the projects might have been.

The objective of the DACT programme was to explore a variety of routes towards ensuring that people with disabilities were enabled to avail of progression, education and development opportunities within the world of work. It was on this basis that each of the DACT projects was awarded funding with a specified end date of 30 April 2015.

However, in the closure phase of the programme, it was recognised by the Department that there would be a number of people still actively participating on some of the DACT projects, so a decision was made to provide funding to seven of the projects, which included the WALK PEER project, for a short period to the end of July 2015. This funding was provided so as to allow projects to ensure that their participants finished their involvement in an orderly manner. All DSP funding to WALK PEER ceased at the end of July 2015.

I understand that the WALK PEER project was subsequently successful in obtaining additional funding from a private sector organisation and I believe that it is this source of support that is referred to and that will terminate in July.

Given the circumstances set out above, there is no provision in the Department's estimates to provide funding to this project and it is not possible to provide a costing for replicating the current arrangements.

I hope this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.