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

Budget 2020 represents another significant and visible commitment to children and families by this Government and I am delighted to have the opportunity to contribute to the debate. I welcome the budget, the fourth I have been involved in as Minister and the fourth that is progressive, where the poorest have gained proportionately more than the richest.

We continue to provide additional resources to meet the needs of some of the most vulnerable people. I particularly welcome the increases in the expansion of the one-parent family payment and jobseekers' transition payments, and the increase to the living alone allowance. These changes, and other measures, will improve the lives of many of our citizens, even while we are making every effort to ready ourselves for a potential no-deal Brexit and the difficulties this would cause for so many people and businesses.

I now turn to the budget 2020 provisions for my own Department. I am especially pleased to advise the House that the gross funding being made available to my Department in 2020 will be €1.604 billion, which represents an increase of 6% over its allocation for 2019. Approximately half of that funding is targeted at public services to protect our children and to provide for their welfare, and the other significant portion is to continue the journey to build an accessible, affordable and high quality childcare system.

In a few weeks, we will launch the new national childcare scheme, sometimes referred to as the NCS. In March, I signalled a target timeframe of 29 October for the launch. The IT system has been built and is being piloted at the moment. It is the objective of any pilot to identify any snags and a minor snag has been identified, which means the scheme will now open for applications in November. Payments to parents, as I have previously advised, will still flow from November.

The introduction of the NCS is a landmark moment for making high quality childcare more affordable and more accessible to families. As many in this House will be aware, since I became Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, my ambition has been to move Ireland from being one of the most expensive countries in the world for childcare to being one of the best. This ambition has focused on three strands - quality, affordability and accessibility - and budget 2020 moves us another step on that journey.

I have allocated an additional €54.5 million to childcare for 2020. This brings the budget to €628 million per annum and represents a 9.3% increase over the 2019 allocation and a 138% increase since 2014. It is a substantive investment that will deliver significant changes. Taking time to pick up and drop off children while commuting to work, and then doing a day's work, is stressful and this is especially true in a lone-parent family. From September 2020, therefore, all parents will be able to avail of an additional five hours of subsidised childcare, whether working or studying.

Budget 2020 has also allowed me to increase by 25% the funding available for preschool access for children who need targeted supports under the access and inclusion model, AIM. This is an incredibly important programme. It provides a range of measures to support children with disabilities to take part in the ECCE free preschool programme in mainstream settings and to help make preschool services more inclusive, benefiting all children in those services.

Another key area of my Department's responsibility is Tusla. I strongly support Tusla's important work in protecting some of the most vulnerable children and families in our increasingly complex and diverse society. These additional resources secured are necessary to deliver on a significant programme of service reform and have also allowed for targeted development of key service areas.

I was delighted yesterday morning to meet some of the young protestors from Extinction Rebellion on Merrion Square. We have a long way to go to reduce Ireland's emissions, but the increase in carbon tax, to which the Minister, Deputy Bruton, referred, will allow us invest more in our just transition agenda. Every budget from now on must focus on climate justice, and our young protestors, and all of society, must be involved in contributing to a just transition to a low-carbon future.

Budget negotiations are by their nature tough and there are many competing demands, but I welcome the recognition that the measures I have put forward to reduce poverty, protect and support the vulnerable and support families must be addressed. I commend budget 2020 to the House.

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