Voluntary Sector
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-05
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Jerry Buttimer (FG), Cork South-Central

Gabhaim buíochas leis Teachta Ó Murchú. As the Deputy knows, the process of the development of a new strategy to support community and voluntary sector as a successor to Sustainable, Inclusive and Empowered Communities is well under way. It is being informed by an extensive public and stakeholder consultation process. This process has included an in-person consultation event, which took place in Tullamore last July and which I attended. I can tell the House it was a very well-attended event. There was strong, robust and positive engagement. This was followed by a very in-depth online public consultation together with bilateral consultation with stakeholder groups and written submissions from across Government Departments. The Minister and I are very anxious that this partnership in collaboration with the voluntary and community sector is continued. There has been a lot of engagement in the consultation process. Almost 250 submissions were received in the online consultation, which took place over a six-week period in August.
The new strategy will be a whole-of-government strategy led by our Department and will reflect the ambition of the Minister and I to work in partnership with the sector. It will be implemented collaboratively with the community and voluntary sector and will be overseen by a cross-sectoral group on local and community development. It is our intention and our ambition that the new strategy will be a four-year one for 2026 to 2030. It will build on the existing structures, strategic objectives and achievements of the previous strategy while also taking account of new context challenges and priorities for the community and voluntary sector.
Our aim is to strengthen further the relationship and the partnership between the whole-of-government and the community and voluntary sector, which has developed significantly over the past couple of years. A further round of consultations with key stakeholders has recently concluded. It is my expectation that the finalised document will be submitted for our Department's approval in the coming weeks with a tentative publication date of quarter 2 of this year.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-05/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:36+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-05