Ms Claire Woods:

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan referred to the IT systems not being in place. My colleague, Mr. Waters, has addressed that. There is a paper exercise and there is a transition period. We have just heard this morning that the target will not be ready, but a number of the working parents may already be in the system availing of the community child care subvention piece. There will be that saver year where they retain benefits. It is not ideal that the IT system will not be ready. However, the current system is paper based for parents anyway, whereas it is online for the child care services.

In regard to Deputy Ó Laoghaire's question about CE sustainability funding, that is finalised and is on the Minister's desk to be signed off. We expect to hear about that very shortly. Pobal has in place the mechanisms as to how that will be drawn down. It will be similar to any funding that is drawn down through the Pobal online system. Our colleagues from the City and County Childcare Committees are at a meeting this morning with the Department of Children and Youth Affairs to finalise those processes this morning. We are just waiting on the Minister to sign off on the funding.

In regard to Senator Devine's question about vulnerable children, we do not expect that to be a significant number. In my own county, we are talking about perhaps seven community services out of the 110 services in the county. They are services for children who will not meet the Hardiker model of child protection at level three for the current Tusla support, which is mentioned in the scheme. They come in at levels one and two, which is family supports. Their parents will not qualify under the current eligibility criteria, that is, they are not in work or education. We are not talking about a significant number of services but they provide significant supports to vulnerable children. There are models and ways of working with that. Historically, there have been supports, through funding directly to community services, for booking places specifically for children who may be referred for some sort of family support but who are not necessarily going to need the support of a social worker. We do not expect it to be a significant number.