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

There is and, I think, will always remain a key place for the community model in the delivery of early-years services, and the social enterprise model is part of that. We have spent much of the morning discussing the issue of capacity. As to where there are shortages of capacity, I come to the following view now, at the end of four years in this role. We recognise that sometimes a private provider does not see the attractiveness of an area for a particular reason. Should we be relying on a social enterprise model, even with additional State supports, to step in, or is the best way to guarantee capacity, particularly in those areas of undersupply, for the State to step in directly? Personally, I am coming to the latter view, that we have done as much as we can with the existing model and brought a lot of improvements but it still has real challenges. That more active role for the State as the focus of the next government, whatever government it is, is probably the best way forward.

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