From Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth
By: Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth; Roderic O'Gorman
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I’m pleased to be here this afternoon to outline the key elements of the Budget 2025 allocation for the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth.
Before I set out the allocations across my department, I would note that this Budget represents a substantial increase in support for children and families; that’s something that’s been core to the Green Party’s term in government and my work as Minister over the last four years.
Overall, my department received an additional €837 million in funding across its vote group. This represents a 11% increase and the highest ever year on year increase in funding for the department - €8.127 billion in current spending in 2025.
The increase in funding reflects the level of demand and funding required to provide assistance to some of the most vulnerable persons in our country.
It is essential in enabling us to advance our vision of a fair, equal and inclusive society, where rights are respected and where everyone- from childhood onwards- is supported to achieve their potential.
In particular, the overall funding package announced today will:
Over the last number of years, I have delivered a substantial reduction in childcare costs for families.
The 2025 allocation of €1.37 billion also represents another record government investment in childcare. It will allow my department consolidate and build on recent progress.
Importantly for parents, it allows us deliver more childcare through the National Childcare Scheme, with more than 216,000 individual children set to benefit from the Scheme in 2025, by far the largest number of children ever to benefit from NCS.
For providers and staff, we will increase Core Funding to almost €390 million in Year 4. As part of this, next year I have set aside a sum of €15 million to cover increased pay for Early Years professionals arising from future negotiated ERO by the Early Years Joint Labour Committee, which would apply from September 2025. The full year funding for this amounts to €45 million. This would be the third successive pay increase for the sector, and hopefully sets out a clear pathway for further increases.
We will also expand Equal Start, the DEIS-model for Early Years, through a new measure of an Additional Nutrition Programme, providing meals to many children in Equal Start services, as well as supports for the development and rollout of Parent Community Coordinator training.
I have always been clear in my ambition to make quality childcare more affordable for parents across Ireland, and I am delighted to have been able to secure the substantial investment necessary to continue to deliver on the halving of childcare costs.
This investment also ensures we make it more accessible through the expansion of the AIM programme and Equal Start programme providing invaluable inclusion supports.
When I took office, the State was spending €638 million on early learning and childcare. That figure is now €1.37 billion. That’s a 114% increase in four years, significantly more than double the level of investment in order to deliver transformational reform of this most important public good.
The Budget also delivers on supporting our most vulnerable children.
Budget 2024 sees an increase of almost 14% in funding for Tusla, the Child and Family Agency. Next year, my department will provide over €1.2 billion in current and capital funding for the Agency.
Foster carers are the bedrock of alternative care provision, providing the best outcomes for children in care as well as the best value for the State. Currently Ireland has among the highest rates of foster care in Europe (90% of children in care).
It is vital that foster carers are supported and valued, in order to keep carers in the system and maintain high rates of foster care relative to other care options.
In last year’s Budget, we increased the Foster Care Allowance, the first increase in this allowance since 2009. This increase is being applied in two stages over the course of 2024, with the second increase applying from 1 November.
In transitioning into a foster care setting there are inevitable additional once-off costs. In Budget 2025 I have secured an allocation of €0.3 million which will be used to provide a bonus payment at the start of each initial placement.
This will aim to alleviate the substantial out-of-pocket expenses during the initial placement period, which can deter potential foster carers from coming forward and can strain the resources of those already fostering.
In providing this payment the immediate material needs of the child can be supported to allow the foster carers to focus on providing emotional and psychological support, facilitating a smoother transition for children entering foster care.
I have also secured funding so that Tusla can better coverage the significant mileage that many foster carers clock up, in bringing the children under their care to various appointments.
Family Resource Centres are a key service in their communities and offer a number of ways for people in local areas to access family support and other services. For that reason I have been a strong advocate for these Centres since taking office.
It was important to me to ensure that existing FRCs could continue to deliver their services so earlier this year with the assistance of Tusla, I increased the minimum level of core funding for all Family Resource Centres to a new minimum of €160,000 for each year. Over 50 FRCs benefitted from that increase.
In addition to that, the staff in all existing 121 FRCs have benefitted from a funding agreement made under the auspices of the WRC in late 2023 and which is being built upon this year and next.
In this Budget I am now making funding available to ensure that even more communities can feel the benefits that a Family Resource Centre can bring to their area. I will make €800,000 available to Tusla to allow for expansion of the FRC Programme membership with the addition of 5 new FRCs across the country.
My department and Tusla will work together now to consider how best to decide where these five additional Family Resource Centres can be situated. I am aware a number of communities are already making efforts to start their own Family Resource Centre.
For youth services, €84.9 million is being allocated in Budget 2025 to current expenditure to youth services, an increase across current and capital funding of €7 million, or 9%, on the 2024 budget.
The additional funding will support the sustainability of Youth Organisations, whilst also expanding youth work service capacity through the funding of 10 new targeted youth services.
It will allow for the implementation of a new national strategy for youth work and related services, support the expansion of initiatives to enable children and young people participate in decision making within the framework of the Participation of Children and Young People in Decision-Making Action Plan 2023-2028.
Finally, working in conjunction with Minister Joe O’Brien, I am pleased to also announce the implementation of a new pilot initiative to support youth services to provide meals to those accessing its services over holiday periods, as an initiative to address holiday hunger.
The area of my Vote with the largest allocation relates to the disability sector. I and Minister Rabbitte were pleased to have secured €3.2 billion of current funding for Specialist Community Based Disability Services next year.
This amounts to a 12% increase in funding on last year and represents an overall increase of €1.2 billion since 2020.
This significant level of funding recognises the challenges facing the sector including the increased cost of service provision, pay cost pressures and service provider sustainability.
The funding will allow my department to build on the expansion achieved in 2024 (acknowledging that there are staffing and infrastructural constraints in the sector, as well as very significant demand).
It will mean that 2025 will see some further expansion, including in relation to Children’s Services, Day Services, Residential Services, Personal Assistance Hours.
This expansion will further assist people to continue living independently in their own homes.
I want to particularly acknowledge the hard work done by Minister Rabbitte to ensure her key priorities in Disability came to the forefront. She will speak in more detail to the policy measures on the Disability side.
This allocation will support the continued implementation of the Action Plan for Disability Services and the roll out of the Roadmap for Service Improvement for Disability Services.
Alongside these areas, €2 billion has been set aside to support those who have fled here seeking our protection – International Protection applicants and people coming from Ukraine.
Overall, I am proud to have significantly increased our allocation – by more than €837 million across current and capital funding.
This is a progressive budget, one that delivers the most for the least well off, and in particular through my own department, targeted measures for those that need them.
Across the department, we are entrusted with responsibility for some of the most vulnerable people in our country – children, children in care, refugees, survivors, people with disabilities, people who may be facing disadvantage and discrimination.
This investment will support us to deliver for each of these groups. We continue to build on previous budgets in driving down costs for all parents and expanding access to early learning and childcare for children with disabilities and children from disadvantaged backgrounds. We continue to increase investment in Tusla and in youth services.
I want to also acknowledge the significant commitment by Minister Donohoe in recognising these priorities while seeking to deliver an ambitious and balanced overall expenditure package.
The €8.27 billion allocated to my department for 2025 gives us the means to respond across all these fundamentally important areas.