Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 19 April 2018
321. Deputy Anne Rabbitte asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the amount of funding provided to the ABC programme for 2018; the number of centres this funding supports; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [17200/18]
Amharc ar fhreagraThe Area Based Childhood (ABC) Programme is a prevention and early intervention initiative led by my Department.
In last year's budget, my department secured additional grant funding to support the extension of the entire ABC Programme into 2018. An original commitment was given to support the programme to the end of August 2018 to align with the completion of the National Evaluation and ABC sites were requested to submit budgets for January to August, 2018. On that basis an overall funding budget of €5.6m was allocated to the ABC sites.
I have since given a commitment to support the current ABC Programme for the full year in 2018. ABC sites have recently submitted full year cost projections for 2018 and my Department is in the process of confirming final grant funding budgets for 2018 in the coming weeks. It is expected that the full budget to be allocated to sites in 2018 will be in the region of €8.5m.
There are 13 sites across Ireland, participating in the ABC Programme. These are located in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Louth, Wicklow, and the Midlands.
