Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome that the Minister finished her response by saying that she will look into the community sector to assist those services challenged with respect to their viability and sustainability. In one crèche in Clare that has a staff of ten, it relies on community employment workers for four positions. I would love to know if the Minister's Department has done an analysis on that. How many such workers were close to qualifying in terms of their major award? If they had started in 2013 or 2014, were some of them almost qualified or could a grace period have been provided to allow them finish their qualification, with support from the community child care sector? When one is doing something like this in January, one is looking at recruitment, staffing and advertising. It is a very difficult time with providers taking in children under the next phase of the early childhood care and education, ECCE, scheme. I welcome what the Minister has said but the community sector is really under pressure at present.

See this speech in context