Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of the Minister, I encourage all parents of children with disabilities to apply for the access and inclusion model, AIM, supports to which the Deputy referred. It is important that we get the message out to the parents of preschool children with disabilities that they ought to apply under the access and inclusion model. To date, more than 2,500 children have received supports under the scheme, but I suspect not everyone is aware of it and want to get that message across. The three to five year timeframe to which the Deputy referred covers the time required to ensure the staff of all services will have attended special training in inclusion which is being rolled out by the Department.

There was a reference to contracts and the assertion made by child care providers that contracts were not available. Contracts have been available to all providers since mid-May. The contracts reference two supplemental publications, the programme rules and the financial guidelines. The rules for the scheme are being rewritten to provide for greater clarity and certainty, based on feedback from the sector. There are no fundamental changes to the rules for the scheme from those currently publicly available. It is expected that the revised, clearer rules will be published in the next couple of weeks.

There was a question about the payment of €14.5 million for non-contact time. Deputies have asked when this sum will be paid. To date, 2,509 facilities have submitted the non-contact application form. That represents approximately 60% of those eligible for the funding. They will be paid in the coming days and we encourage the remaining 40% of providers to apply as soon as possible.

I thank everyone who has spoken about this matter. It has been a valuable debate.

I am encouraged the discussion on the challenges faced in early years care and education is seen as a matter worthy of our attention. Many important points were raised by Deputies and in considering the debate as a whole I was struck by the general level of agreement across a range of topics. We all agree investment is required to move forward and that the sector requires a valued, motivated and suitably educated workforce to deliver quality services to our children. These are among the important matters we will raise with Cabinet colleagues in the context of the future Estimates discussions.

There has been a clear focus throughout our discussion on the matter of pay and conditions. This is reflective of conversations I and my officials have had with over 1,000 providers and practitioners in recent weeks and months throughout the country. Some measures have been taken to assist employers with pay costs, such as the higher capitation payment mentioned in the opening address and the €18 million in non-contact time payments to be made available this year, but I appreciate that the underlying funding model needs review. It is my strong view that appropriate terms and conditions for the workforce are critical to our aim of building a sustainable infrastructure of accessible, high-quality and affordable child care in Ireland. We must ensure our investment is targeted at both quality and affordability. As a Minister of State, I am committed to addressing both simultaneously.

The independent review of the cost of providing child care in Ireland, which will be commissioned in the coming weeks, will assist greatly in providing independent and objective evidence to inform future policy. Should trade unions and other representative bodies in the sector advance a sectoral employment order, my officials will assist with any submissions required for the process. If such a process concludes and reaches a point where recommendations are made to the Labour Court, I would be a strong advocate for appropriate investment.

Along with the issue of pay, I recognise that sustainability of services remains an issue. We mentioned earlier the €1 million that has been made available to child care services to help replace unqualified community employment scheme workers and the continued work of my officials to better understand the specifics of the challenges that certain providers face. Learning from these interactions is informing policy in this area. The more affordable child care measures being introduced this September and the affordable child care scheme, which I will mention again momentarily, will both make a significant contribution to improving sustainability. Both will reduce the co-payment required from parents, as that co-payment on occasions to date proved too onerous for some families, resulting in services failing to recoup it. The income from these measures will be a reliable income and demand for child care services should increase, allowing services to expand and remain in full operation over summer months, as out-of-school demand grows for school-age children.

Since the Minister's appointment, a priority has been to meet early years care providers directly, as well as making individual visits to services and meetings with various organisations. She established the early years forum to provide for a structured engagement with the sector and she is delighted to chair quarterly meetings with the forum. I hope this improves communications and helps all of us to focus on solutions. Recent nationwide information events carried out by departmental officials were attended by people from over 1,000 providers, giving an opportunity for officials to inform the sector directly about forthcoming change and also to listen to concerns of the sector. The sector is unrecognisable from what existed ten years ago and it is still developing and changing. I pay tribute to the sector for its engagement with this development and change, as there has been a constructive partnership with the Department on this journey.

In concluding my contribution to this evening's debate, I will take some time to speak about the ongoing development of the affordable child care scheme, the single most fundamental reform undertaken in child care in a considerable time. I will highlight a number of recent positive developments. Reform of our traditional system of delivering child care supports is much-needed and there are currently five different child care funding programmes. There is one universal programme, the early childhood care and education programme, and four targeted programmes. Those targeted programmes are community child care subvention, child care education and training support, after-school child care and community employment child care programmes.

The four targeted funding programmes are administratively complex and inadequate in terms of accessibility. They vary widely in terms of access and eligibility criteria, as well as rates and levels of support. For example, in budget 2017, the Government provided funding for the development of a new single affordable child care scheme that would merge and reform the four targeted schemes. This new scheme will provide an infrastructure from which future investment in child care may be administered. The Minister was delighted to negotiate additional funding of €19 million for the development and implementation of the affordable child care scheme. That scheme will be introduced at the earliest possible date and in the meantime a very significant step will be taken from September 2017 to make child care more affordable for thousands of families throughout Ireland by making a number of enhancements to the existing targeted funding programmes. These enhancements include, for the first time, the payment of universal child care subsidies for children aged from six months until commencement in the early childhood care and education programme. Targeted child care subsidies will also increase significantly, some by 50%. The affordable child care scheme and the September measures are good news for children and families but they also represent good news for providers, as they will lead to increased and more reliable income.

The access and inclusion model was launched in June 2016 to enable the full inclusion and meaningful participation of children with disabilities in the early childhood care and education, ECCE, programme. The aim of the model is to support early years settings in delivering an inclusive preschool experience, ensuring that every eligible child can fully participate in the ECCE programme and reap the benefits of quality preschool education. The access and inclusion model is child-centred and it involves seven levels of progressive support, moving from the universal to the targeted based on the strengths and needs of the child and early years setting. Applications for the access and inclusion supports have been accepted since June 2016 and 2,892 children across 1,390 early years settings have been supported through targeted supports. It is envisaged that universal and inclusion model supports have reached even greater numbers of children and early years settings. As we continue to roll out the scheme over the next two years, my officials are committed to hearing feedback from providers and parents as to how the scheme can be further improved.

A number of other recent significant developments in child care have been designed to address matters of affordability, accessibility and quality. These initiatives include expansion of the ECCE programme so children, parents and providers would benefit from an average of 61 weeks in the programme, as opposed to the original 38 weeks. This increased the number of children benefitting in April this year to 120,00, up from 67,000 in 2016.

The introduction of the 2016 child care regulations are designed to underpin quality service provision. There was the introduction of learner funds and a graduate bursary to support the upskilling of the early years work force. There was also the introduction of the national early years quality support service, Better Start, and mentoring and support resources for early years services. We have seen the appointment of national Síolta and Aistear co-ordinators to work with 55 mentors across the country to support upskilling of the workforce and the introduction of an early years inspection function within the Department of Education and Skills, as well as enhancement of the Tusla inspectorate. All these are important initiatives designed to improve quality, affordability and access.

A Programme for a Partnership Government contains a significant number of commitments related to access to high-quality and affordable child care. The Minister is committed to seeing these through to fruition. Many steps have been taken and we must acknowledge these but more action and investment is undoubtedly required. I thank Members for their contributions on this important subject, which is very dear to the Minister, both professionally and personally.

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