Ms Marian Quinn:

When talking about early childhood care and education, we are talking about the way it is delivered. We are saying there are three ways to deliver it. I would say it is a public service and is delivered in three different ways because it is contracted. The Government, since it became involved in early childhood care and education, has not taken the ball and opened centres itself. It has contracted and paid money for other people to do it on its behalf. Even when we talk about the ECCE scheme, we speak about how the Government subsidises early childhood care and education but it does not subsidise it. It contracts people to deliver it on its behalf and it gets fierce value for money because it does it on the cheap and through the exploitation of the people working in those services. That issue needs to be examined.

Prioritising where we spend the money is difficult because it is almost like pitting children against each other. What does one do? Some children have additional needs but there are all the other children in the country as well who have their childhood. They deserve to have that childhood now and for it to be a really good one. They also deserve it now given the contribution they will make in future society. This is where the Department of Children and Youth Affairs-Department of Education and Skills debate comes in. By remaining within the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, children in crisis are being pitted against all the children in the population. As the Minister said to us, if he can pay for an extra social worker as opposed to investing money into mainstream services he will have to give it to the social worker. This is a short-term gain because the child has a crisis need now and it needs to be met but, in terms of the future, the prevention of some of those crisis needs could be done by investing now. That is the thinking on this issue.

On the issue of a legacy, the unfortunate thing in this country is that we seem to work from political cycle to political cycle. It seems to be a case of what politicians can say or do to get themselves across the line in terms of an election. Everyone wants to leave a legacy and a legacy can be left here. This group and the Government can feed into the idea of this being where they make the change.

It keeps coming back to where the Minister, Deputy James Reilly, is going to find the money. It is a matter of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform deciding that this area will now have to get a significant amount of money so that within the pot of the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, it will not be taken from a child with additional needs and placed in the mainstream fund. It needs to be absolute funding. There is an argument for involving the Department of Education and Skills because then one does not have that crisis. One has education at various levels, but the real worry is that it will just be from age three up and that it will be said anyone can do it for children from birth to three, despite the fact that so much learning happens at that stage, and highly qualified staff are not needed. I acknowledge that we will get the reassurance that it will not happen, but if one has six years going into a Department, the budget has to cover it. Whether the money be put in for that whole six years to guarantee equal treatment is questionable despite that fact that in primary schools, junior infants and sixth class do not get different capitation. It is about looking at that.

People were talking about all the influences and how everyone is impacting on early childhood and the child in early years. The committee saw at one of the first meetings the document that Thomas Walsh from Maynooth provided in terms of all of these organisations that are impacting on what is going on. Even the few that we have mentioned today are a drop in the ocean in overall terms. The list barely fit on a page and even when I looked at it afterwards I was thinking that certain ones had been left out. The list did not encompass everyone, which is how crazy this is.

It was mentioned that the taxpayer will be the person who pays because this is a substantial investment. We are looking at going from 0.2% to 0.8% as an OECD average figure. That is approximately €1 billion that we need in investment. If one increases the investment incrementally over the next number of years, one is working on at least €200 million per year to get it up to that OECD average which is a significant amount of money. There are no two ways about it; the taxpayer will pay, as taxpayers pay for primary school, secondary school, third level and lifelong learning. There has not been a question over how we should do that, be it by direct investment or some others means. The money is found and it is provided. However, the taxpayer will gain because the children now as well as the children and grandchildren of taxpayers will benefit from a childhood we should be proud to provide in this State. We should be proud to have qualified, experienced professionals meeting their every need in a child-friendly, play-based way that follows and supports the child. That is what we should want. I cannot imagine there is a taxpayer in the country who would not want that for his or her children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews and neighbours. It cannot come down to a question of why people who do not have children should have to pay for it. We do not adopt that approach in any other area of care and education and we should not be doing it for this. Taxpayers will also benefit from the returns to society. These children will grow up to be the adults who will be lifted out of the poverty trap and who will be engaged in employment, pay taxes and contribute in terms of being entrepreneurs because they have had a creative start and support to do it. They will be the doctors, nurses, solicitors, politicians, early childhood professionals and support personnel. They will give back to the community. Whether I have children or not, they will give to me later because I will need a public service that they will be providing for. It is about investing now. Umpteen top-quality economists nationally and internationally have shown the return. Anyone who got a guaranteed return on investment of one to seven or one to ten would jump at it. It is about the spending of money now.

In relation to the figures on a graduate-led workforce, the last Pobal report showed that 86% of people were at level 5. That was before the learner fund kicked in properly. The majority got it themselves when there was not even a minimum requirement to get it. They paid for it themselves and gave up their own personal and family time to get it. At level 6 the figure was 46%, which definitely does not go into the millions. Again, that was before the learner fund and it has got higher. People were told they needed a minimum requirement for this September and they went and really neglected their own families to get this but it has now been postponed because decisions are made at the click of a finger. At level 7 and above, the figure in the last Pobal report was 13%. I do not know where that 13% is because there are still those who are currently within the workforce who have gone back and got their level 7 and higher. One also has more students coming through college, although my experience from the students I work with is that they are asking how they can get their qualification and get out - out of the country or out to work directly within services - because they know they are not going to be able to earn an income. They have got such a fright over the last two years and have asked why they are getting their degrees when they are going to get minimum wage. They might decide to stay on with the jobs they have to support themselves through college but they certainly will not be able to earn an income.

While more people are graduating, quite a number of the 13% have gone to Better Start. The department of inspection is looking at another inspection that is going to be tied into the contract despite the fact that it is inspecting something that has not been rolled out. It is the cart before the horse. The inspectorate will be taken from the early childhood degreed workforce, which is more people going along with those who are needed for tutoring, lecturing and filling all the gaps and spots. We do not know where the 13% is and whether there has been enough replacement of it.

One has the accredited training but one also has the CPD people do in the early childhood profession. The following is a disgrace. I could engage with Síolta or Aistear training, my centre might get the QAP validation because we have all engaged in it and I might get some work out of the training, but when a primary school teacher does the Aistear training, he or she can get CPD credits. It is the exact same training. The Department of Education and Skills has put money into training, albeit it was not particularly great training, for junior and senior infants teachers to get Aistear training. We are still waiting for it. There is a new practice guide that links Síolta and Aistear to help us put things together, but it must be done in our own time unless we look at the 30 mentors that have been put in place for 25,000 people. It will have to be the professionals taking that up themselves. We are struggling even to get a printed document. While it is available to print off the website, there is a massive cost in that. So much is happening. We had one person who documented how much it cost her to engage with the Síolta QAP. It cost her €5,000 to get the free QAP in terms of the whole process as she had to pay her staff something for going as it was on their time and for all the document printing. She has a small centre and the cost would be higher at a bigger one. Free training which is hit and miss in terms of the comprehensiveness of its roll out is still costing centres money. In her accounts, which she presented to one of the previous Ministers, she was getting €4.85 an hour. She is a provider, entrepreneur and employer and she was getting €4.85 while trying to achieve maximum quality.

We are supposed to be trying to help the children to move out of the poverty trap. If children get this great start, it will pay dividends in later years. What tends to happen with the Government is that money is put into crisis management time after time with the effect that the hole is dug deeper and deeper for the children, parents and practitioners and providers who are working with children. People cannot continue to do what they have done. In Germany, there was a strike for six weeks. In Ireland, people say they cannot go out on a Tuesday because they need to be there for the families. That can only happen for so long because they are shutting their doors. Quality centres are shutting their doors and their quality staff are going on the dole. It is crazy. In terms of priorities, it is about targeting the Department of Public Expenditure and the other Departments in terms of justice, social welfare and all of those other issues. Given the savings that will happen, part of the funding should come out of those departmental budgets also. It will ultimately benefit them.