Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

Tomorrow, many of these issues will be discussed at the Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights, under the chairmanship of Deputy Ardagh. The committee is having a full day's hearing on many of these issues and Deputies will no doubt debate them when the committee meets tomorrow at 9.30 a.m.

I agree with Deputy Sargent on the concept of children going to school at 7 a.m. and getting out at 7 p.m. That would not be easy for any child. There has long been an argument that spare capacity in schools, particularly classrooms, should be used. I would not object to them as an appropriate environment for child care facilities. The Minister for Education and Science tells me discussions on these issues are ongoing.

Following discussions, the Government decided some years ago that we should put the resources into child benefit. The benefit increased substantially from less than €0.5 billion per year to more than €2 billion, but did not solve all the problems. We also increased the number of child care places to 40,000. I know that is not enough and that people incur substantial costs in this regard. Many other proposals for improvement are now coming forward.

The Government has not closed its mind to looking at the suggestions made under the equal opportunities child care programme and many will be aired at the committee meeting tomorrow. Some weeks ago in this House I said some of these suggestions must be considered but we cannot forget that we decided that the best way forward was to put money into child benefit. Because of that decision, everyone, not only those parents at work, received equal treatment. Nevertheless, we are not ignoring the substantial burden placed on parents who are at work and must pay a lot of money for child care and seek out places for their children. That is why we are talking of using schools and community halls and of opening places which would not be too expensive. Insurance and other issues are being examined as part of this debate.

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