Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

As we speak, hundreds of community facilities, providing child care services to thousands of families, are extremely concerned at the Government's plans to end the equal opportunities childcare programme and replace it with the new community child care subvention scheme. Yesterday, I had the opportunity to meet the Minister of State, Deputy Brendan Smith, on this matter and I thank him for that opportunity. That meeting was attended by representatives of community child care providers in County Monaghan and all expressed their serious concerns at what lies ahead for child care in the State if the community child care subvention scheme is implemented in its current form and timetable for implementation. That concern is echoed throughout the 26 counties, as evidenced by contributions of other speakers.

Nobody disagrees with the stated intent of the scheme, which is to make child care more accessible for low income parents. Far too many families still cannot gain access to child care due to lack of affordability. This has serious consequences for children and for parents who wish to improve the lives of their families through part-time or full-time employment. The equal opportunities child care programme addressed the need to some extent, but it did not provide, nor was it intended to provide, a comprehensive, universal system of child care. Such a system is the one favoured by Sinn Féin and we detailed our proposals in a Private Members' motion in the last Dáil and in pre-budget submissions to the Minister for Finance.

This Supplementary Estimate will probably be the last bloc of funding for the equal opportunities child care programme. Funding for grant recipients will continue into the first six months of next year during the proposed change-over from the EOCP to the new subvention scheme. Therefore we are at a crucial point and we must use this opportunity as a matter of urgency to press the Minister and his colleagues in the Department to reconsider the new scheme in its present form. I urge him to suspend its introduction pending an essential review, comprehensive consultation and necessary changes.

The new scheme requires community child care operators to work a complex, tiered fee system according to the income of service users. Community-based child care workers will be asked to process social welfare information about friends and neighbours. The new scheme will require a lot more administration and bureaucracy, which small community-run facilities will find difficult.

Under the new scheme, community child care providers will receive subventions to enable reduced fees to be charged to disadvantaged parents, but these parents must be in receipt of social welfare payments. Clearly, therefore, we are not really addressing the matter on the basis of need. Many families using community child care facilities are on low incomes but do not receive social welfare payments. Yet receipt of such payments is now to be a requirement to qualify for the new subvention scheme. Without a sufficient number of welfare recipients on their books community crèches will be forced to close altogether or raise fees for those not qualifying for the subvention. Thus low-income families and many more in already stretched circumstances — that rises way up the income ladder in today's Ireland — could actually be forced to pay more. This makes a nonsense of the claim that the new scheme will be better for the disadvantaged. I warrant that it will not be so.

There are genuine fears that the new scheme will also lead to division between welfare recipients and other service users. We could end up with a two-tier child care system mirroring our two-tier health system. The facilities under threat are community-based and community-run. Many people give time voluntarily to sustain them. In many cases EOCP staffing grants are insufficient to cover all staffing needs, which are supplemented by voluntary effort. It would be shameful if an ill-thought-out scheme undermined the voluntary child care infrastructure which has been built from the ground up in recent years.

Will the Minister agree to suspend the introduction of the new scheme while extending the EOCP method of payment in the meantime, pending full consultation with the community child care sector? No other answer will meet the current needs.

See this speech in context