Department of Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs

About Us

As part of the restructuring of Departments and agencies announced by the Taoiseach in Dáil Éireann on 23rd March 2010 to ensure greater coherence and produce more efficient delivery, the Department of Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs was established. 

The Department of Community, Equality and Gaeltacht Affairs has responsibility for a wide range of policies and programmes and is currently headquartered in Dublin, with its other main offices located at Na Forbacha, Co. Galway, and Tubbercurry, Co. Sligo. On foot of Government decisions on the Decentralisation Programme, the headquarters of the Department will move to Charlestown, Co. Mayo.

Functions for which the Department has specific responsibility include:

• Community & Local Development Programmes
• Community & Voluntary Support
• Social Inclusion and Family Policy
• Equality, Human Rights and Integration
• Co-ordination of the National Disability Strategy
• Co-ordination of the National Drugs Strategy
• Rural Development initiatives, including the EU Rural Development Programme 2007-2013
• The Irish language
• The Gaeltacht
• the development of Ireland’s inhabited off-shore islands.

A number of State Boards and agencies with responsibilities in the Community, Rural, Equality, Gaeltacht and Irish language sectors are funded from within the Department's Vote Group, including two cross-border implementation bodies - An Foras Teanga comprising Foras na Gaeilge and Tha Boord o Ulster Scotch and Waterways Ireland who are co-sponsored by the Department (along with the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure in Northern Ireland) in accordance with the terms of the British-Irish Agreement Act 1999.

Links to Agencies & Bodies under Departments Aegis: