Strike ballot due as community partnerships set to close

Community development partnerships in five of the most deprived areas in the State will have their funding withdrawn and will close or begin to wind down in coming weeks.

Hundreds of staff in CDPs in Dublin, Galway and Waterford, who may lose their jobs at the end of the month, will be balloted by their union Siptu for industrial action next week.

The Department of the Environment has announced funding to partnerships in Ballymun, Fingal and Rathmines/Pembroke in Dublin, as well as in Connemara and Waterford, would end on April 1st.

Among the services they provide are meals-on-wheels, home repairs for the elderly, addiction services, adult literacy classes, enterprise development and return-to-work supports.

The announcement came as the department announced €28 million of funding for 50 partnerships across the State under the new Social Inclusion and Community and Activation Programme (SICAP). The €28 million is for the remaining nine months of the year.

The new SICAP model replaces the Local and Community Development Programme which had been the funding stream for the sector for almost 20 years.

Community roots

Under the old programme, funds were provided by the department to 50 local development companies, which in turn dispersed funds to smaller projects. It was felt these companies were rooted in the local community.

Under SICAP, 51 “lots” of funding will be administered by development committees based within local authorities. Local area partnerships were being invited to tender for these “lots”.

There were objections from many partnerships to the new tendering process, which was described as a move to privatise the sector and seen as pitting communities against each other.

These criticisms were rejected by the department, which said tendering would ensure community funding was in accordance with the public spending code and best international practice.

In five areas there were two partnerships competing for a single “lot”. There are now five unsuccessful tenders.

The Ballymun-Whitehall area partnership, for example, lost out to the Tolka area partnership for a lot of €1.1 million, while Forum Connemara, based in Letterfrack, lost to Galway Rural Development, based in Athenry, for a lot of €1.2 million.

Loss 'devastating'

John Coyne, chief executive of Forum Connemara, described the loss of funding as "devastating".

The partnership, which has over 100 staff, was established in 1989 as an anti-poverty measure and targets services at the elderly and young.

Gerard McLoughlin, Siptu convenor in the Ballymun-Whitehall partnership, says the partnership’s presence in the community will be gone when its office in the Ballymun shopping centre closes on March 31st.

The partnership, established in 1991, has 10 core staff and up to 100 supported staff.

It provides a range of supports and services including childcare training, housing repairs for the elderly, outreach work with young people, enterprise support and general advocacy for locals.

Mr McLoughlin does not believe the Tolka area partnership will have the capacity to take on its workload. “And people in the area don’t know where it is,” he added. The Tolka partnership office is in Finglas, 3km away.

Staff in the Ballymun partnership do not know whether anyone will be taken on by the Tolka area, or whether they will be unemployed in four weeks.

Redundancy questions

If they are, they do not know what kind of redundancy package will be available. The situation is replicated in the other four partnerships.

Pobal, which is administering the dispersal of SICAP funding on behalf of the department, said it wanted to “reassure individuals, families and their communities that every effort will be made to ensure continuity of the work and services provided locally to the most disadvantaged.

“While we cannot discuss the specifics of any processes regarding employment-related matters arising from the transition of SICAP services to successful tenderers in certain areas, we assure you that Pobal is providing a range of appropriate supports to all of the organisations involved.”