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

As the Deputy knows, the ECCE programme provides free universal preschool care to children in the eligible age range. The programme is provided for three hours per day, five days per week over 38 weeks each year. The programme year runs from the end of August to the following June in line with the primary school year. Data provided by Pobal, which administrates the ECCE programme on behalf of my Department, shows that of the services offering the ECCE programme at the end of the 2021-22 programme year, 44 did not continue to do so in 2022-23. It is important to note, though, that there has been a net increase of 67 services offering the ECCE programme this programme year, as new services began offering the ECCE programme in 2022-23. The number of children expected to register on the 2022-23 ECCE programme is 109,000. That is very similar to the number of children who registered on the 2021-22 programme, which was 107,700.

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