Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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802. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the percentage of childcare services subsidised for children under three years of age; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [32546/14]

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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A number of childcare programmes are implemented by my Department to assist parents with the cost of childcare. These include the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme, the Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) programme, and the Childcare Education and Training Support (CETS) programme. There is no specific funding allocated to provide for children in the 0 to 3 age category but childcare services can be availed of through one of the above programmes.

The ECCE programme provides funding to support approximately 68,000 children each year but the minimum qualifying age is 3 years 2 months at the commencement of the school year and children under this age do not have access to this provision.

The CCS programme provides support to community not for profit childcare services to enable them to provide childcare to lower income and disadvantaged families at reduced rates. Eligibility for support under the programme is based on the income status of the parent and children of all ages are eligible to enrol for support. There are more than 900 community childcare services participating in the CCS programme.

The CETS programmes support parents who are participating in Solas and Education Training Board (ETB) training and education courses with the cost of childcare. Children of all ages are eligible for support under this programme.

Two additional support programmes, the Community Employment Childcare (CEC) programme, which provides support to CE programme participants for children in the 0 to 13 age category, and the After-School Child Care (ASCC) programme, which supports certain categories of parents seeking after school care for primary school children, were introduced under the CETS programme and are currently implemented by my Department. The total number of providers in contract to provide services under the CETS programmes is 1,600 but it should be noted that the ASCC programme relates to school age children.

There are in the region of 4,500 notified childcare services currently delivering childcare services with nearly all of those participating in the ECCE programme. All of these services are eligible to apply for entry to the other support programmes with the exception of the Community Childcare Subvention programme which is limited to community services only.