Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----or somebody who looks after a few children in his or her house after school or an au pair. We do not want to over-regulate, undermine or get rid of that system because if we did, it would be a disaster. Tens of thousands of people would find that they did not have any way to look after their children and might have to leave the workplace. This would then make it harder for them to pay the rent or mortgage so we definitely do not want to over-regulate or be too heavy-handed in any reforms we introduce in this area. At the same time, we need to put children first and we cannot ignore the fact that some children are being minded in homes that are not very safe and they could get injured. There are health and safety issues in those houses that are providing informal childcare at the moment.

We must also bear in mind that some people who are childminders have a bad record when it comes to how they deal with children, as we learned to our detriment when it came to foster parents in the past-----

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