Imelda Munster (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There definitely are and it is causing untold stress for parents. I ask the witnesses to furnish us with all of those data on the waiting lists. There seems to be a huge disparity geographically but the other issue is bringing down the prices. The Department says it is freezing prices but that is not good enough. At what point is it going to bring prices down? I will give an example. A local teacher told me she was quoted €410 per week for two children, which is close to €900 per month per child. The nearest crèche she could get was 30 minutes from her home. Her current mortgage is €900 a month and her childcare is working out at €1,600 a month. That woman is the mother of a three-year-old and a nine-month-old. She has stretched out her unpaid statutory leave and her parental leave and there is no crèche that can provide full-time places. There is nothing for the child under one. There are people like that in every town and village across the country. What is being done about that?