John Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail)

I will reply on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Mary Harney.

I wish to reaffirm the Government's commitment to people with disabilities and to the national disability strategy and its long-term goals and objectives which we will continue to pursue in the coming years in partnership with all the key stakeholders.

The early childhood care and education scheme is being introduced from January 2010 as a free scheme to benefit children in the key developmental period prior to commencing school. The scheme will allow eligible children to avail of a free preschool place in the year before they commence school. The scheme is open to all private and voluntary preschool services which are notified to the Health Service Executive or registered with the Irish Montessori Educational Board. Participating services will be required to provide an educational programme consistent with the principles of Siolta and appropriate to the age of participating children. As a free preschool year, participating services must agree to provide the service in return for a capitation fee of some €2,450 per annum.

The scheme is a general one and participating services will be required to make reasonable accommodation for children with special needs in accordance with the Equal Status Acts 2000 to 2004. However, the scheme takes account of a number of issues to accommodate children with special needs. While the age range in which children will qualify for the scheme is, generally, between three years three months and four years six months on 1 September each year, exceptions are allowed where a child has been assessed by the HSE as having a special need which will delay his or her entry to primary school. In such cases, the preschool year relevant to such children will be taken as their qualifying year. Additionally, the general requirement that a child would be expected to attend four or five days each week will not apply to children with special needs where a shorter week would be more appropriate to their needs. Where a preschool service is a specialist one providing a service to children with special needs and additional flexibility in the arrangements for the scheme is required, this will also be considered.

Since 2005, the Government has provided significant additional resources for services and supports for effecting real change in the development of services for people with disabilities and as a demonstration of the ongoing commitments to people with disabilities, an additional €10 million was provided in the 2009 budget to continue the development of services for children with disabilities. A critical element of the ongoing development of disability services is the requirement to provide financial support for the development and implementation of a wide range of services provided to children with disabilities.

In the current challenging economic environment, there is a responsibility on all publicly funded services to review the way in which services are delivered and ensure resources are used to maximum effect. The HSE and voluntary disability service providers are working together to ensure that all of the existing resources available for specialist disability services are used in the most effective manner possible. This involves a collaborative approach at local health office level in dealing with arising situations, development of criteria for identifying needs in a consistent manner nationally, identification of capacity to increase provision within existing resources, reviewing existing service arrangements in the context of appropriate response and service efficiency and developing innovative responses to meet requirements.

There is no additional capitation available under the ECCE scheme to preschools on foot of having children with special needs. However, ad hoc arrangements have been made in some local health offices utilising home support-personal assistant resources to support children with specific difficulties accessing mainstream preschool services. The provision of such supports is dependent upon the assessed needs of the child and the resources available. In the current challenging financial environment, there are many competing priorities and the HSE is obliged to use the resources available to it in the most efficient and effective manner possible. The Department of Health and Children and the HSE are working closely to manage the considerable budgetary challenges in this regard. The cross-sectoral team on disability comprising representatives from the Department of Health and Children, the Department of Education and Science, the HSE and the National Council for Special Education will be considering the provision of educational supports to children with disabilities in the coming months. Additionally, the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs will continue to fund training in the child care sector, including training courses which equip child care workers with the skills to support the integration of children with special needs into mainstream services.

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