Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

As I said previously, my Department currently invests €638 million per year in early learning and childcare, and affordability for parents is a key objective. The major programmes funded by the Department are the early childhood care and education programme and the national childcare scheme. The ECCE programme provides free access to early learning and childcare for 15 hours per week for the two years before the child starts primary school. That significantly offsets the childcare costs for parents at that stage. The national childcare scheme provides universal and income-assessed subsidies to parents. The universal subsidy is for children up to the age of three years and the income-assessed subsidy is for children up to the age of 15 years. They are available for up to 45 hours per week. They are very substantial and are a vital support from the State for parents. However, I recognise and agree with the Deputy that childcare costs for parents are still too high.

Covid-19 brought major challenges for the early learning and childcare sector. In line with many other services, those services had to close and then operate at lower capacity. They also had to meet the important public health requirements. We were able to support parents and children during the pandemic. In addition to the investment by my Department, the Government provided very substantial supports to the sector to keep services open and operating safely and to ensure they are sustainable and can meet the additional costs that Covid has generated for them. There is strong evidence that those supports have worked. In 2020, there was no significant increase in fees for parents, which was unlike previous years in which there were very substantial increases. In 2019, there was an 8% increase, but in 2020 and 2021 there were no substantial increases for parents.

However, affordability remains a key concern. It is an issue I am very conscious of in the context of the budget negotiations this year, but it is also an issue that is linked to the sustainability of services and the pay for staff in the sector.

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