Family Resource Centres Seanad Éireann — 2026-04-15 ============================================================ Frankie Feighan (FG), Sligo-Leitrim I thank Senator Kyne for raising this important issue and giving me the opportunity to respond. In regard to family resource centres, I started my political career about 26 years ago through our family life centres. It was part of the outreach services of the family resource centres. The service they provide in every town, village and major city around the country is exceptional. Many times people came to my office with issues. We have certain skills but for the skills that I do not have it was reassuring to ring the family resource centre and put them in touch. They were professional and confidential every time. I know the work they did and I thank them for the great service they give. Commissioning a new family resource centre is an operational matter for Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, which is responsible for day-to-day administration of the family resource centre programme. Neither the Minister nor the Department have any involvement in the assessment process for new members of the family resource centre programme or selecting the new members. The Senator rightly said that Connemara has a huge geographical spread and there is a gap there. I will take that back to the Minister. There is a programme of Government commitment to work to increase funding and expand the capacity and network of family resource centres in budget 2026. This commitment will be honoured with funding secured for a further ten family resource centres. This has brought the family resource centre programme membership up to 126 members in 2026. It follows an increase in the membership of the programme in 2025 by five members. A comprehensive national application assessment process was undertaken in 2025 which was led by Tusla and independently chaired by a representative of the University of Limerick. A total of 49 organisations applied for membership of the family resource centre programme, following an open call from Tusla for applications. This indicates again, as the Senator said, the strong level of interest in communities across the country in having family resource centres as part of their community infrastructure. Regrettably, funding only allowed for 15 new members to be selected, leaving 34 applications unsuccessful. I thank those organisations for their interest in joining the programme and for the important work they continue to do in their communities. The benefits of community-based services such as family resource centres cannot be overstated and many of us will have witnessed at first hand the impacts family resource centres have on the communities they serve. They engage with vulnerable families, offer services to individuals across the whole life cycle from early years to senior citizens and, crucially, foster a positive and inclusive community spirit. The range of services they provide can be extensive as determined by the needs of the relevant communities. It is particularly important to note, and I think the Senator would agree, that many services are delivered at no cost or at low cost to families who otherwise might not be able to access them. Also, by availing of funding schemes operated by other Government Departments and agencies, there is great potential for family resource centres to grow their scope and reach and further embed themselves in their communities. I understand there is currently no additional funding available to further expand the family resource centre programme in 2026. The Minister has previously indicated that she intends to continue to pursue the expansion of the FRC programme through the budgetary process and in line with the programme for Government commitment. I will bring the Senator’s concerns back to the Minister. He certainly has outlined with great coherence the fact that this geographically widespread area needs another family resource centre to fill the gap there. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-04-15/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:48+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-04-15