Frances Fitzgerald (Fine Gael)

Children who are taken from their families, for all sorts of reasons, often end up in care. If proper supports were available in the community, they would not end up in care. I know from my own experience that the assertion in The Irish Times article that care placements "can cost in excess of €500,000 a year" is true. If we were to invest the same amount of money in family support services, up to 40 children could be supported. We need to reflect on the kind of supports we offer to children in care and vulnerable families.

I would like to highlight the pressures which are being faced by community care teams at present. As jobs are not being filled, community care teams are not in a position to react to the most serious cases. The Seanad has previously discussed the plight of children in vulnerable families who are at risk. I know the Minister of State is well aware of the huge pressure that is on these services.

Many people were concerned when the community child care subvention scheme was introduced last year. At the time, the then Minister responded to some of those concerns by making some changes. However, a day of action and protest is being organised by incensed child care workers, stressed providers and pressurised parents who are not pleased. The flaws and difficulties in the scheme are evident to employees, service providers and parents. I have spoken to child care providers in Clondalkin who are concerned about the many problems associated with this scheme. I am sure the Minister of State is familiar with the new report that has been produced by the Lourdes centre. Those who worked on the report interviewed service providers and highlighted key difficulties.

After ten years of the Celtic tiger, it is sad that this country does not have the sort of child care services it should have. I do not doubt that many parents are spending the equivalent of a second mortgage to meet their huge child care costs. I recently read a newspaper interview with a young couple who have two children. When the reporter asked them how they can get high-quality child care at a reasonable cost — €300 a month — they said they managed to do it by emigrating to Spain.

A recent OECD report highlighted this country's failure to provide affordable and accessible child care of a high quality. Those of us who have been arguing over many years for high-quality child care are disappointed that matters have not improved after ten years of prosperity. I recognise that significant amounts of money are being invested in child care. There is no doubt about that. I welcome the increase that has been provided for in some areas this year. The manner in which child care has been planned has led to the provision of services which are expensive and difficult to access. Child care is not available to some parents. For those who can access it, child care is very expensive.

This House debated the issue of universality earlier. If we had taken a universal approach to the provision of child care, for example by guaranteeing three and four year olds a year of high-quality pre-schooling, I wonder if we would be in a better position on foot of all of the money that has been spent. As things stand, access to child care is uneven. That is why workers in this area are preparing a day of action. I ask the Minister of State to comment on the new report, which I mentioned a moment ago. I am sure his office has examined it. Those who compiled the report have told me that the feeling on the ground is that the community child care subvention scheme is misjudged. It is not working as well as it should be. It is creating a set of new problems. I ask the Minister of State to comment on the problems in question.

I wonder whether an extraordinary point that emerged recently can be correct. A recent meeting in Dublin, involving Pobal and the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, revealed that just one child care provider was consulted during the early stages of the formulation of the community child care subvention scheme. As there are 161 community child care providers in the greater Dublin area, there should have been more consultation. Further consultation is necessary at this stage. The scheme needs to be reviewed again. Many of the problems associated with it need to be resolved. The Minister of State needs to consider whether some aspects of the scheme are helping people as it was thought they would. The scheme is based on uneven foundations. The Minister of State has misread the situation.

The report I have mentioned, A Study of the Effects of the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme, illustrates some of the negative consequences of the scheme. I wish to highlight some of the consequences in question. Those who compiled the report consulted widely within the sector. They argue that the entire scheme is inequitable. They suggest that it has deprived many low and middle-income families of child care. Such people can no longer afford the massive increases in the payments sought under the scheme. It has been estimated that the increase in child care fees for working parents since 2007 has been between 50% and 166%. In real terms, those who were paying €80 last year may be paying as much as €200 this year. The Minister will agree that in the current economic situation the scale of increase in child care fees is unsustainable for people who were just about holding onto their jobs and are getting no increases, where job security is threatened, especially since if they go on social welfare they can get full-time child care. There is something very problematic about that. It needs to be examined.

The fundamental problem with the scheme is that it is based on a per-child subvention and is means tested in a way that penalises low-income and single parent families. Given that their children receive a smaller subvention, they are charged more than parents on social welfare. The scheme penalises parents who work and makes it seem more beneficial for a parent to be on social welfare and avail of the scheme than to work full time in a relatively low-paid job.