Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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12. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the number of the 500 after-school child care scheme, ASCC, places taken up now that the eligibility for 52 weeks is ending; the measures put in place to provide child care for these children at the same affordable rate; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [22963/16]

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Having listened to the Minister's previous response, I will probably ask her to meet more women for a different reason. She is probably browned off answering questions about child care schemes and the various ways of funding them. My question is specifically about the after-school child care scheme that was introduced when the previous Tánaiste and Minister for Social Protection cut the one-parent family payment to ribbons on the premise that this would put lone parents back to work and take them out of the so-called social welfare trap. She did so on the basis of providing excellent Scandinavian-style child care, which, I am afraid, still only exists in Scandinavia. Could the Minister comment on this scheme and the progress relating to it?

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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As of 18 July 2016, there were 739 children availing of the after-school child care programme. This equates to 318 after-school places. Of the 450 parents who are registered for ASCC this year, 29 have used their 52-week maximum allowance.

For parents who have used their maximum allowance, the community child care subvention programme and the community child care subvention programme, private, may be options. Both of these provide funding to child care services to enable them to provide quality child care, including after-school care, at reduced rates to low-income working parents. Parents qualify as disadvantaged or being on low incomes on the basis of means-tested entitlements.

Further details of these programmes are available through the city and county child care committees. The after-school child care programme has a budget of €1.5 million for the 2015-2016 academic year and has capacity to provide 340 whole-time equivalent after-school places annually. Each eligible parent is given a maximum allowance of 52 weeks of ASCC. This allocation does not have to be used consecutively but when it is exhausted, the parent's eligibility ceases. ASCC child care places are subject to availability and are allocated on a first-come-first-served basis. The programme pays child care services €40 per week for an after-school place or €80 per week in situations where the child care service provides a pick-up service that collects or brings the child to and from school. The programme also provides a full day-care rate of €105 per week, for a maximum of ten weeks, to cater for school holiday periods. In all cases, the maximum fee payable by parents is €15 per week per child.

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I raise this because there is a cohort of parents caught in an anomaly. They are the people I mentioned who suffered badly due to the cuts in the one-parent family payment. There is a back-to-work family dividend, which has been gradually cut when they have gone back to work. Is the Minister aware that in June of this year 8,100 lone parents lost €14.90 per week, per child because of the cut in that back-to-work family dividend? Coincidentally, many of them would have exhausted their 52 weeks after school child care scheme just as the summer holidays kicked in and the schools closed, which is creating hardship upon hardship for quite a significant cohort of lone parents. Will the Minister comment please?

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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I thank the Deputy. I was not aware of those statistics. I am distressed to hear that. I would be very committed to looking for ways to ensure that as they move on to different ways of providing public support the lone parents and their families get back what they may have lost through previous cuts. I have identified some of the ways to do that within the programme for Government.

The child care places are a concern of mine. The way to move forward and correct that is to look across the board, particularly at after-school places. Are they in the appropriate locations? Are they available for women and men who as single parents have specific needs for their children because of their working arrangements? I think this is why some of the schemes in the past have not supported them. A cross-departmental group has been established to deal with after school care. I promise to bring the concerns the Deputy has identified to the work of that group.

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I appreciate the Minister answering, comprehensively and at length, the various questions, or sometimes the same question asked in different ways about child care , supports, etc., but the Government is not stepping up to the plate. Several other members of the Government, such as the Ministers for Social Protection, Finance and Education and Skills, should be involved. There has to be a much more holistic approach to child care than the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Deputy Zappone, answering the questions about where the money is divvied out.

One of the groups that lobbied us during the election campaign - and one of those I was most impressed with for its presentation and ambition - is Start Strong, which advocates early childhood education. It makes the obvious point very well that the greater the investment in young children, the bigger the return as they go through life. There is less chance of them falling into addiction, going to prison or experiencing any other problems. It reckons €1 billion is required to get this right. Somebody, it could have been the Minister or Deputy Coppinger, quoted a sum of approximately €300 million earlier. That is a third of what is required to get this right in our small little country. Perhaps we could chat with other Ministers about the need to address this. It is not just a problem for the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs.

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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I welcome Deputy Bríd Smith’s presentation of cost-benefit analyses of quality child care and the importance of dealing with prevention and early intervention with other Ministers. I am trying to voice that to them. I am in complete agreement with what the Deputy says. This goes across the board. We need to ensure that those who govern the nation can see this. I think they understand the development of the arguments about the importance of prevention and early intervention to save money later. If one accepts and understands that, one has to invest earlier during that period. I accept what the Deputy is saying and I welcome her comments.