Budget 2026: The Wheel Calls for Sustainable Funding and Reform

The Wheel, Ireland’s national association of charities, has today launched its pre-Budget 2026 submission, Thriving Communities in a Changing Ireland, with a clear call to Government: it is time to formally recognise the community and voluntary sector’s role in delivering frontline public services, by allocating sustainable funding and meaningful policy reform.

Launching the submission, The Wheel is urging the Government to increase funding across key departments and services in line with the sector’s growing responsibilities and the critical gaps it fills in public service provision. From responding to recent crises like Storm Éowyn, the war in Ukraine, and the COVID-19 pandemic, to providing core health, housing, childcare and community supports, the sector continues to act as Ireland’s “hidden infrastructure”; agile, trusted, and indispensable.

Guillaume Jacquinot, Advocacy and Campaigns Manager at The Wheel, said:
“The Irish State continues to rely heavily on the commitment and capacity of community and voluntary organisations to respond to national emergencies and long-term social challenges.

“We are proud of the recognition the sector has received in recent years, but recognition without resourcing is not sustainable. It’s time for the Government to match their words with action and provide long-term, adequate funding for the services our communities rely on. Budget 2026 is an opportunity to deliver on the Programme for Government’s ambition to create ‘thriving communities’ while confronting urgent issues of inequality, climate resilience, and social cohesion.”

Comprising over 35,000 organisations, the community and voluntary sector employs one in every eight workers in Ireland and is supported by more than 76,000 volunteer trustees. In 2022 alone, the sector’s total economic impact reached €32.1 billion, with nearly half of its income self-generated through fundraising, a clear indication of how the sector continues to subsidise public service delivery.

Despite this, many organisations remain financially precarious. According to The Wheel, major challenges persist:

• A lack of multiannual funding
• Inadequate level of funding for State-contracted services
• Rising energy and insurance costs
• Mounting costs of compliance with regulatory requirements
• A looming pension auto-enrolment crisis
  
  Key recommendations in Thriving Communities in a Changing Ireland include:
  
   
• Provide funding that covers all running costs for services provided by the community and voluntary sector to ensure their sustainability.
• Move towards the provision of multiannual funding for the sector on a phased basis.
• Apply an additional 20% allocation to each department for pay awards agreed through the Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) to cover increased inflation-based costs such as insurance, pension auto-enrolment, governance costs, and other essential expenditure not covered by the two WRC agreements.
• Increase the overall Department of Rural and Community Development funding by 5% to €495 million, to ensure sufficient resources for community organisations to meet increased demand for services and to respond effectively to.
• Include the cost of compliance in all new State funding contracts, reviewing and streamlining compliance and regulatory requirements to ensure that regulation in all its forms helps, and doesn’t over-burden organisations.
• At least €30 million for the Community Climate Action Programme.

The Wheel’s submission reflects extensive consultation with its 2,500+ member organisations. It aligns with the Programme for Government’s ambition to create “thriving communities” while confronting urgent issues of inequality, climate resilience, and social cohesion.

“If we want communities that are resilient, inclusive and future-ready, then the State must stop treating the sector as a stopgap and start treating it as a strategic partner, added Guillaume Jacquinot.

“The forthcoming Budget is an opportunity for the Government to invest in the people and organisations who quietly hold this country together every day.”

Several members of The Wheel spoke at the launch event in Dublin to highlight the issues our communities face in Ireland and share their recommendations to ensure a sustainable future. 

Ber Grogan, Executive Director of the Simon Communities of Ireland, said, “At the Simon Communities of Ireland (SCI), we have to remain hopeful that real change is coming and will be delivered. Unfortunately, to date, sector consultation does not always feel meaningful. Investments and markets seem to be valued above basic, yet fundamental, human rights. We’re urging Government to put people at the centre of their decision-making, the tens of thousands experiencing homelessness, the countless numbers of people living in consistent poverty, and the vast numbers unable to afford rent or access mortgages. How can our communities thrive if people cannot afford to live in them?”

Dr Tracey Monson, CEO of the Daughters of Charity Disability Services, said: “Sustainable funding for organisations like ourselves is essential to ensure that we can continue to meet the high quality standards of the services that we provide to children and families most in need. The increasing governance and compliance which places additional administration burdens on front line staff takes them away from engaging directly with those that need our services and fulfilling our core purpose as a charity and not-forprofit organisation. Multiannual contracts and funding is essential to enable us to plan to address evolving and future needs. I welcome the commitment of the DCEDIY and Tusla and their engagement with our sector on sustainable funding so that community and voluntary organisations can continue to provide essential services now and into the future.”

Susanne Rogers, Research and Policy Analyst at Social Justice Ireland, added: 
“Despite the general perception, the myth, of Ireland as a land of story tellers, a land of the hundred thousand welcomes, loneliness is a real problem in Ireland today that cuts right across all sections of society. This is not about a failing of any individual to make and keep friendships - it's about the systemic loss of community spaces, it's about housing that moves you further and further away from support networks, it's about transport that results in longer and longer commutes, it's about poverty, deprivation and exclusion. This is why The Wheel is calling for Government to fully resource a Loneliness Strategy that is cross-departmental and codesigned with sector organisations through the Loneliness Taskforce, which is scheduled to be developed and presented to Government this year.”

Read The Wheel's Pre-Budget Submission