Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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90. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to confirm the staff retention rates among early years educators for the past five years; the actions being taken to improve staff retention in the sector; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [20975/25]

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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Will the Minister confirm the staff retention rates among early years educators for the past five years and the actions being taken to improve staff retention in the sector? Will she make a statement on the matter?

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy. The annual early years sector profile survey does not collect staff retention data specifically. However, it does record data on staff turnover. Data from this survey shows that, over the period from 2019 to 2023, staff turnover rates ranged from 23% in 2019 to 24.5% in 2023. The 2023 data shows that almost one third of the turnover rate is due to staff moving from one provider to another. Staff turnover is linked to pay and working conditions. While the Government is the primary funder of the sector, the State is not an employer of staff and neither I, nor the Department, as I have said previously, set pay or working conditions.

The joint labour committee process is the formal mechanism by which employer and employee representatives can negotiate minimum pay rates for the sector, which are set down in law through employment regulation orders.

10 o’clock

Outcomes from the joint labour committee process are supported by Government through core funding, which has seen its allocation increase from €259 million in year one to €350 million for the coming programme year 2025-26.

As many Deputies have referred to, an additional €45 million is now ring-fenced in the coming year to support employers in meeting the costs of further increases to the minimum rates of pay. This allocation is conditional on updated employment regulation orders. Officials from my Department continue to discuss issues of recruitment and retention with stakeholders through a subgroup of the early learning and childcare stakeholder forum. The general consensus of the subgroup is that pay and working conditions are a significant barrier for recruitment and retention. In addition to ring-fenced funding to support improvements in pay and working conditions, some outcome actions from the subgroup include the importance of introducing the student fast-track process for recognition of studies to work in services out of term, and the assessment of unfinished qualifications, whereby people who may have started a relevant qualification but did not get to finish it can have completed work assessed for meeting qualification requirements.

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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I very much appreciate that additional funding is going into this area. It is interesting to see that the majority of services reported having difficulty recruiting staff over the last 12 months, a process that was reported as difficult or very difficult by 95% of managers. The challenges of recruiting and retaining staff are having stark consequences, with 30% of managers reporting that problems recruiting or retaining staff will result in service closure, an increase of 6% over the previous year's survey. The threat of room closures was reported by 42% of managers, an increase of 9% from 2022. There is a challenge there and it is about trying to meet that challenge and the demands out there in the provision of the services. This needs a continued review and planning for the year forward and into 2026. We need to make sure we have a substantial increase in funding over the next 12 months.

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I confirm there is a significant increase through core funding. It is going to €350 million for the 2025-26 year, which is a hugely significantly amount of resource provided by the State. As I said previously, 92% of providers are participating in the core funding model. In its entirety, if we look at the last three years and going into this following year, almost €1 billion is being expended by the State here. It is a real surety for providers that this funding is being made available. It is important to say when we talk about closures and the threat of closures that we have had lowest level of closures ever in the system over the past six years.

The Deputy is 100% correct that the most important thing here is to ensure that those who work in the sector are suitably recompensed for working in the sector because if we do not have the workers then the providers cannot provide the service and parents cannot ensure their children are being cared for.

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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I fully agree that a lot of work is being done and a lot of improvements have occurred.

The other challenge in early childcare is access to appropriate facilities. We need to work together on access to facilities, not only in the Minister's Department but also across other Government Departments. I have come across a number of areas where there is difficulty in getting access to facilities and therefore the service cannot be provided in particular areas. We need to do a lot more work on that, and especially in new housing areas where developers are slowing up in the provision of new facilities or there is no-one available to come in to provide those facilities. It is not only a staff challenge, it is also a challenge around the provision of the facilities. This will be a more difficult challenge to face due to costs increasing in recent years.

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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It is important that there is now a forward planning unit in the Department to ensure we are looking towards the future to see where there are significant gaps in the need for the service and the lack of the service being provided. The Government has given the commitment in the programme for Government that where this gap might be in play, and where no providers are taking the opportunity to provide the service, the State will step in. Currently a mapping tool is being developed and utilised by the Department to ensure we have the most up-to-date information on that.

On ensuring the workforce is suitably upskilled, the nurturing skills programme is a very important source of support for workers. There has been a significant uptake, be it for professional development or ensuring that people can move to level 7 and level 8 qualifications, and the funding is provided for same.

Keira Keogh (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister. We now move to question No. 91 in the name of Deputy Cathy Bennett. Deputy Claire Kerrane will ask this question on Deputy Bennett's behalf.