Results 161-180 of 20,908 for speaker:Norma Foley

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Family Support Services (7 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: Tusla has shared the following response with my office:With co financing from the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+), the Department through its National Model of Parenting Support Services, in partnership with Tusla and Treoir, has worked to transition and expand the Teen Parent Support Programme (TPSP), into the Young Parent Support Programme (YPSP).Through this expansion, the 11 existing...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Health Services Waiting Lists (7 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: This is a matter for the Local Authorities.

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Childcare Services (7 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: The 2001 Planning Guidelines for Local Authorities on Early Learning and Childcare Settings were issued under section 28 of the Planning and Development Act 2000. The Guidelines are intended to ensure a consistent approach to the treatment of planning applications in respect to the land use planning aspects of early learning and childcare provision. The Programme for Government...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Thalidomide Victims Compensation (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: Since March of this year, the National Thalidomide Advocacy Office has supported four individuals to apply to Contergan in Germany for recognition that their disabilities are as a result of Thalidomide exposure. The National Thalidomide Advocacy office received acknowledgements on the 23rd of September 2025 that all four applications have now been received by Contergen. These applications...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: The number of unique children registered for early years and school age childcare for the 2025/2026 programme year-to-date is as follows: Programme Number of Registrations as of 30/09/2025 ECCE 2025/2026 102,364 CCSP Saver Programme 2025/2026 576 NCS 2025/2026 190,878 Total number of...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: I propose to take Questions Nos. 387 and 388 together. The total number of unique children that are registered for the ECCE 2025/2026 programme call as of 30th September is 102,364. 49,403 / 48% unique children are registered in the 2025/2026 ECCE Programme Year 2 as of 30th September. The number of unique children registered this time last year in the 2024/2025 ECCE Programme is up...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: I propose to take Questions Nos. 389 and 390 together. The Programme for Government 2025 commits to "Explore making available an extra hour of ECCE each day in the second year of preschool". This commitment was informed by an independent review of the ECCE Programme which was published in October of last year. During the course of the ECCE Review, representative organisations,...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: In June, I announced the introduction of maximum fee caps for all Partner Services in Core Funding from September 2025. These new maximum fee caps will place a limit on the fees that can be charged across all types of provision. This will reduce costs for families who are facing the highest fees across the country. The fee freeze will remain in place for all Partner Services with fees that...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: Improving access to quality and affordable Early Learning and Care and School Age Childcare is a key priority of Government. Currently approximately a quarter of all early learning and childcare provision is delivered by not-for-profit operators and three quarters by for-profit operators. For-profit operators range from sole traders and partnerships to much larger scale multi site...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Medical Aids and Appliances (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: It is entirely open to the health professional in the HSE to determine what equipment is essential to safely meet the needs of the child. All equipment to be used for the support needs of individuals must be prescribed and risk assessed. It is important to have due regard to the rights of child in the use of a restriction in the provision of supports and services. Services have a...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Departmental Reports (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: I recognise that pregnancy loss is a tragedy which takes an enormous toll on expectant parents. The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth commissioned a qualitative research study to examine the workplace experiences of parents coping with pregnancy loss. The study, ‘PLACES | Pregnancy Loss (under 24 weeks) in Workplaces: Informing Policymakers on...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: A wide range of supports are available through the Access and Inclusion Model (AIM). The Access and Inclusion Model supports children with additional needs to access and meaningfully participate in the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme through 7 levels of universal and targeted supports. AIM Level 5 provides funding for specialised equipment, appliances or small capital...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Childcare Services (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: I propose to take Questions Nos. 396 and 397 together. The Department oversees the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) compliance function which is administered by Pobal CAR (Compliance, Audit and Risk). Pobal CAR are responsible for carrying out compliance inspections on service providers. These inspections check if services are adhering to certain programme rules and contract conditions, as...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Childcare Services (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: To confirm, subsidies awarded under the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) typically last 12 months. Every NCS award has an end-date which is clearly stated on the award. Applicants must renew their application before this end-date if they wish to continue receiving a subsidy for their child. If they do not renew, the award will expire and the subsidy payment will stop at the end date i.e. the...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: In June, I confirmed the introduction of maximum fee caps for all Partner Services in Core Funding from September 2025. These new maximum fee caps will place a limit on the fees that can be charged across all types of provision. This will reduce costs for families who are facing the highest fees across the country, while promoting fairness in the market by addressing fee income disparity. ...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: After-School Support Services (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: Many families avail of the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) as a way to reduce the cost of their early learning and childcare. The purpose of the NCS is to reduce the cost of childcare for parents by way of a subsidy paid directly to the childcare provider. The NCS does not purport to cover the operating costs of the childcare provider. Core Funding is a grant for early learning and...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Early Childhood Care and Education (2 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: I propose to take Questions Nos. 401 and 402 together. Each year, Pobal compiles and publishes data from Early Learning and Care (ELC) and School Age Childcare (SAC) providers as part of the Early Years Sector Profile. While the allocation of ELC or SAC places is flexible, the published capacity data provides an estimate of the number of children enrolled in ELC and SAC at a given time. ...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Family Support Services (1 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: The Programme for Government contains commitments with regard to kinship carers. Accordingly, the Department is in the process of developing a national policy on the rights of children living in informal kinship care. As part of the development of the national policy the Department:is in the process of completing the scoping exercise on informal kinship care in Ireland. This exercise will...

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Disabilities Assessments (1 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: As this question refers to service matters, I have asked the Health Service Executive (HSE) to respond to the Deputy directly, as soon as possible.

Written Answers — Department of Children, Disability and Equality: Disability Services (1 Oct 2025)

Norma Foley: In Budget 2025, a total of €3.2 billion was allocated for HSE Disability Services. This amounts to an increase of 11.5% in funding (some €333m), on funding provided in 2024. Specialist Disability Residential services make up the largest part of the Disability funding disbursed by the HSE, approximately 60% of the total budget. Budget 2025 provided €107m to residential...