Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Pobal 2018 early years sector profile report indicates that more than 29,500 people now work in the childcare sector, an increase of 8% on the previous year. The proportion of staff with third-level qualifications is now 22%, up from 20% in 2017 and 18% in 2016. Some 94% of staff now have, at a minimum, a relevant qualification at level 5, an increase of 6% since 2015. The average wage in the sector has risen 2% in the past year to €12.17 per hour and the staff turnover rate has fallen from 28% to 25%. Although the Pobal data demonstrates a growing sector and some small progress on pay and turnover rates, much remains to be done to address the situation.

As the Deputy will be aware, I care passionately about this issue. My Department is not the employer and it does not pay the workers' salaries. I cannot, therefore, set pay levels or determine working conditions. However, I have taken several measures to help the sector address how its workforce is valued. The Government has provided a 117% increase in investment in the sector over the past four budgets. I have used some of this funding to raise the early childhood care and education, ECCE, capitation rate by 7% this September, to make programme support payments in recognition of administrative work and to provide a higher rate of capitation payment for graduate-led preschool rooms. I hope that these measures, particularly the ECCE capitation increase, will have impacted on salaries when Pobal next reports in 2019.

Importantly in the medium and long term, First 5, a whole-of-Government ten-year strategy for babies, young children and their families which I recently published, sets out a number of critical commitments to address workforce conditions. These include a workforce development plan and a commitment to develop a new funding model that will leverage increased investment for improved quality. As I indicated in response to a previous question, I have called on the sector to use available State infrastructure to agree an appropriate salary scale through a sectoral employment order.

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