Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I support my colleague, Deputy Ó Caoláin, who has moved the amendment on behalf of Deputy McLellan. It is important that childminders are explicitly included. We talk about being consistent in our legislation. By virtue of the previous amendment, the Minister took the view that there was a need to include occupational therapists and specify occupational therapists in this legislation. This, of itself, justifies the need to specify childminders clearly and explicitly.

There is in the region of 50,000 childminders in operation in this State. It is a totally unregulated sector that has been unregulated in the past. I acknowledge that is not only the responsibility or a consequence of this Government. Anyway, the sector remains unregulated. When the national vetting legislation was going through - the Minister alluded to the vetting legislation previously - we tabled amendments to include childminders. At the time, the Government voted down the amendments to include childminders. As I said, at a conservative guess there are 50,000 childminders working in this jurisdiction, our State. They are dealing with children on an ongoing basis.

Many of them are non-relative childminders and many of them are dealing with children numbering more than three. It is imperative that we refer to childminding explicitly in the legislation. As I stated, good legislation must be consistent. Given that the Minister has referred explicitly to occupational therapists, I would expect him to follow suit with this amendment and refer explicitly to childminders.

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