Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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9. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government to provide an update on his Department's efforts to fulfil the programme for Government commitment to review the 2001 Childcare Facilities Guidelines for Planning Authorities to ensure childcare spaces are provided and put into use; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [65825/25]

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I seek an update on the Department's efforts to fulfil the commitment in the programme for Government to review the Childcare Facilities Guidelines for Planning Authorities, which date from 2001, to ensure childcare spaces are provided and put into use.

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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The programme for Government sets out a number of priorities for the Government relating to access to early learning and childcare services, including a commitment to review the 2001 Childcare Facilities Guidelines for Planning Authorities to ensure childcare spaces are provided and put to use. Further to the commencement of Chapter 3 of Part 3 of the Planning and Development Act 2024, on 2 October provisions for national planning statements were introduced to replace the provisions for ministerial guidelines issued under section 28 of the Planning and Development Act 2000. All existing section 28 guidelines will, over time, be revoked and replaced with new national planning statements, including childcare guidelines. The current guidelines will, however, remain in force until revoked or replaced by a corresponding national planning statement.

My Department is working with the Departments of Children, Disability and Equality, and Education and Youth and has established a working group, chaired by the Department of Children, Disability and Equality, to create a clear mechanism for sharing information on and discussing current and future policy related to the planning of early learning and childcare services, including examining the role of the existing childcare guidelines for planning authorities. To date, eight meetings of the working group have taken place over the course of 2024 and 2025, with the most recent meeting held in September 2025.

Work to date has included engagement with the planning and land use committee of the County and City Management Association, which supports the interdepartmental working group. The primary focus of this work is to gain a practical overview of the application of the existing guidelines with a view to initiating the drafting of a national planning statement which will complement other work being undertaken by the Department of Children, Disability and Equality to support the provision of childcare facilities.

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister. A commitment was made in the programme for Government to increase childcare supply by building or acquiring State-led facilities. There are 43,000 children on waiting lists for early learning, childcare and school-aged care places. In our planning system, the only provision to safeguard land for childcare facilities is a basic formula from 2001 which allocates 20 childcare places for every 75 homes. It is rudimentary and littered with loopholes. One-bedroom apartments are not included in the calculation and builders can secure an exemption by pointing to other childcare facilities in an area, even if they have waiting lists. Sometimes facilities are not built.

The guidelines are literal in their application. For example, if there are two adjacent applications for 70 homes there would be no childcare facility. If we are ever to meet the demand for childcare places in local communities, we need to effectively link the delivery of new housing with the delivery of childcare places, and that is our opportunity to acquire State-led facilities. If the Minister is looking for a practical overview of existing guidelines, I have spoken about them extensively in the Chamber.

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy. I am aware that she has spoken about this on many occasions in the Chamber, including with the Minister, Deputy Foley. She is quite consistent in raising the importance of childcare facilities. I can assure her that the Minister and her Department are actively engaging on this. I will meet the Minister, Deputy Foley, in the next week on this matter to see how we can further the pathway. It is a matter for the Department of children to work out the policy. It holds the pen in that respect. The Department of housing is involved in terms of facilitating the national planning statement and ensuring we can deliver these facilities. As the Deputy said, it is important to have State-led facilities.

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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To assist the Minister with that meeting, I would say it is time our planning authorities were required to scale up their competency in childcare. At present, assessment of childcare needs occupies a low level of priority when it comes to assessing planning applications in large-scale residential developments. That needs to change. There should be mandatory technical guidelines for childcare facilities so that units are suitable and usable as childcare facilities in size, design, regulatory compliance and location. They should not be built at the back of estates, essentially as housing units, for numbers of children that are not viable for childcare providers. We need to end the prevalence of childcare units lying empty in places of overwhelming childcare demand, such as in my constituency of Dublin West where units have lain empty for years. By updating the guidelines, the Minister can create an effective pipeline for State-led childcare facilities that will build the mixed private-public model of childcare that we desperately need.

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I again thank Deputy Currie for raising the important matter of childcare facilities. I agree that it is timely and in accordance with the programme for Government that we update the planning guidelines. As I said, we will work with the Department of children. Ultimately, it is the Department of children that will work out the policy on this area. The national planning statements will form an important part of planning for almost every Department across government. As I said, we stand willing and ready to give technical advice on what is necessary for those statements. Those relating to childcare facilities need to be updated. Having empty facilities is totally unacceptable. There is no question that there have been too many instances where developers have technically put a facility in place, but have made it far too difficult or cumbersome for it to be used for its intended purpose. It is something of which I am very much aware.