Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein)
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There is a crisis in areas like Finglas and Ballymun with regard to the availability of places in preschools and crèches. Finglas has expanded greatly over recent years but no thought appears to have been given to a corresponding expansion in the number of crèche and preschool places. Preschools and crèches face significant challenge in trying to meet the needs of services like Brandon House, Tusla, the CDNT in Finglas and Ballymun public health nursing. Setting up a preschool is a complex process involving a long planning process and getting required fire and disability access certifications. There are also significant costs relating to architects' fees, planning fees, building works for fire certification and so on. No funding or supports are given for these costs.

There is also a lack of recognition for the skills and qualifications of those who work in preschools. Preschools are no different from primary and secondary schools in that they are educational facilities with highly educated and professional workforces. This lack of recognition for these professionals is reflected in the clear disparity in wage structures between those who work in preschools and those who work in primary schools. Preschool teachers are paid €20,000 less than their primary school counterparts. There is also no pay for non-contact time or consideration for summertime pay for preschool teachers. This inequity in pay needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency.

Preschools provide an invaluable service to our communities by supporting children with complex needs and those living in homeless accommodation hubs. It is increasingly difficult to place vulnerable children who need the types of supports a preschool provides because there are just no places available for them. Local children's disability network teams are constantly asking for preschools to take more children with additional needs and preschools are expected to take these children with no additional supports. These vulnerable children need a supportive and healthy environment. It is crucial for their development.

How preschools are funded is a problem. Core funding is based on the number of children, with this figure capped at 22 children per class, and preschools are only funded for 38 weeks of the year. This impacts on both the schools and the children as there is no funding for essential maintenance, equipment or even school trips. There is no funding for any of the school breaks at Christmas, Easter or summer. AIM level 7 support pays €240 a week for three hours daily, five days a week, 38 weeks per annum. Support is capped at two extra assistants per class regardless of the number of children with needs. To give a local example, there is a preschool in my constituency that has so many children with additional needs they have to share the teaching assistants provided under the scheme. The school is forced into the position of having to reduce hours for children with special needs, which is detrimental to those children's well-being and development. Preschools are also having a real problem finding teachers because they can only recruit those with an ECCE degree. Those with other qualifications appropriate to special needs assistant are excluded from the recruitment process.

Teachers who are working in preschools have to shoulder an enormous workload, which is proving to be very stressful for all concerned. Because of all these challenges and the difficulty in recruiting teachers with ECCE degrees for the limited number of hours they can be contracted to work for, the reality is that positions in these schools are not being filled and can lie vacant for some time. Preschools are an important component in the development of children, especially those who have special needs or who come from socially or economically deprived areas.

Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Minister of State very much. Preschools are education facilities. They are no different from primary and secondary schools. Responsibility for them needs to be moved to the Department of Education and they needed to funded as education facilities with proper salary scales. For these people to be paid €20,000 less than a comparable person working in primary or secondary education is absolutely wrong.

To give the Minister of State some idea of the scale of it, some 141 preschools closed their doors in 2022, and another 42 closed this year up to June.

Preschools must build on their own. They set up without funding or help from the Government. They do not receive funding from parents and they only receive core funding. They face huge costs, including in planning, architect's fees, fireproofing and fire doors. They have no holidays, pensions or even pay during summer breaks. To give an example, the annual salary for a first-year preschool educator is €15,960. That is €14 per hour with 30 hours per week and 38 weeks of work. Compared with that, the annual salary for a first-year primary school educator is €38,637. That is for 35 hours per week and 38 weeks of work. It is no wonder preschool teachers are leaving the service. Ireland is the EU state that provides the lowest funding to early years education. We are haemorrhaging people from the sector because of the salaries. They cannot even get a mortgage because of the type of wages they are getting. It seems unfair and I wish we could look at incorporating this into the Department of Education.