Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

I am not a member of the committee and it is impossible. However, I am working on it and in the coming weeks, I hope to solve the problem. I believe the Minister of State knows the answer to that.

At the end of the day, this is all about implementation. The key to all of that is resources. I refer briefly to a number of points in the Minister of State's preamble, including the reference to the Central Statistics Office's quarterly national household survey in late 2002 which was published in July 2003. This represents the background information in regard to the proposal to address school age child care and those attending primary school. The figures cited are 67,500 families, of whom 62,600 represent a mother or guardian in employment but only 1,100 in education and a total of 125,000 primary school children receiving non-parental child care in after-school services. Given that the survey is now almost five years old, is there any updated information to give a clearer picture of the current situation?

I welcome the intent to allow for VAT exemption in respect of school-age child care services in line with the exemption that already applies to the pre-school child care services. This undoubtedly will have an echo of welcome throughout the sector.

The Minister of State referred to amendment No. 21 in relation to the provision of services by other than a relative or a sibling and the number of children where such care can be provided exempt from sections 51 to 57 being five children from different families, three of whom may be pre-school children. Will the Minister of State clarify whether in the current situation the number is three? This amendment proposes to extend the number.

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