Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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I move amendment No. 11:

In page 11, to delete lines 1 and 2 and substitute the following:“(f) specify the class in which the child is enrolled at school or whether he or she is enrolled in a pre-school programme funded by the Minister or the Minister for Education and Skills,”.

Amendments Nos. 11 and 32 relate to the way in which the Bill refers to the ECCE preschool programme. Amendment No. 11 relates to section 9, which sets out the information which must be included in an application for financial support. Section 9(f) requires information on the child's stage in the education system as it is necessary to determine how the hours of child care support will wrap around the hours of school or the ECCE preschool programme. This amendment changes the language from the class the child attends at school and whether he or she participates in preschool to the class in which the child is enrolled at school and whether he or she is enrolled in preschool. The change ensures consistency with language to be used elsewhere in the Bill through the proposed amendments to section 13 and provides clarity that it is a child's enrolment in a class which matters, rather than a child's attendance as attendance may vary, for example, as a result of illness.

The amendment also adds a reference to preschool programmes funded by the Minister for Education and Skills as some children take part in the Early Start programme that is funded by the Minister for Education and Skills, rather than the early childhood care and education, ECCE, preschool programme.

Amendment No. 32 relates to the wording of Schedule 2 on HSE referrals, which is intended to allow for section 14 referrals for children who need child care on developmental grounds, who are too young to benefit from free provision either through the ECCE preschool programme or the Early Start programme and who would otherwise not attend a child care service. This amendment is consequential to the amendments to section 13, which seek, effectively, to future-proof the legislation for possible future changes to ECCE rules as a result of which parents could be given flexibility to choose when to take up the ECCE entitlement. To provide this flexibility, instead of referring to the qualifying age for participation in the ECCE, the amendment refers to whether a child is enrolled in a preschool programme either the ECCE preschool programme or the Early Start programme. The upper age limit of four years for HSE referrals reflects the two-year entitlement to the ECCE preschool programme and the compulsory school starting age of six years old.