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

I am building for the first time a radical new infrastructure for our children and families. The passage of the Childcare Support Act marks the first time ever parents and families have been entitled legally to a financial subsidisation. I am correcting decades of underinvestment in this arena. It takes a long time to correct that.

As I have already indicated, we have had an increase of 117% in investment in this sector over the past four budgets. Those kind of statistics demonstrate we are interested in both the children and their families, as well as the workers in the sector.

I have indicated to the Deputy the ways in which we have invested more money in the services and the providers, particularly with raising the ECCE capitation rate. It is hoped that this will ultimately be passed on to the sector and to the people who work in it.

Several times I have called on the sector to pursue a sectoral employment order.

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