Jerry Buttimer (Fine Gael)

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit, Deputy John Moloney. It is extraordinary that we are debating child care again today. I do not believe speaking on child care should be the preserve of female Senators. I speak as an uncle and godfather of five children under six. The formative years of children are vital and those of us in education understand this.

Sometimes I wonder if Ministers lose sight of the fact that children are very important. It is acknowledged that we are, and are becoming, more and more laid back in the provision of child care. We are now, as Senator Quinn said, falling behind other European countries. For many parents today child care has become a second mortgage. Another important point is that children today may not see their parents from 7.30 or 8 o'clock in the morning until 6 or 7 o'clock in the evening. Under the Constitution the State has a duty to our children. We are not fulfilling that duty. As a consequence of community child care, are we going to make childcare the preserve of the private sector? Is that what the new ideology of Fianna Fáil, the Green Party and the few Progressive Democrats is going to be? Is that what we are trying to do?

We have had 11 years of plenty, and of boom and bloom. Senator de Búrca mentioned building child care infrastructure. Why do we not do it? We are discussing means testing and universality yet again today. If we are serious about being child-centered in 21st century Ireland — and one can take Piaget, Erikson or Freud — early intervention through child care and preschool is very important. As Senator Corrigan knows well, by the time children come to secondary school or even into bunscoill, it is too late in many cases, and they have lost the whole cognitive development period of their lives.

The debate is welcome. The cuts in funding community child care are imposing much restriction and hardship on people. I ask the Minister of State, if he does nothing else today, to go back to the Ministers for Health and Children and Finance, and readdress the community childcare subvention scheme. Senator Fitzgerald, in her remarks, made reference to the manner in which the 2009 budget has affected the elderly and children. Child care support, child-based subvention for those over 18 and registration fees in colleges all affect young people. I will return to a question I asked a moment ago. I do not believe the Minister of State, Deputy Moloney, or Senator Corrigan believe that the value of Government is to impose cuts on young people and education for savings of several hundred million euro. Is that the value we place on young people and young parents?

Whether we like it or not, we are hitting the low paid and the vulnerable in community child care schemes. We are forcing women in particular to make difficult choices. A young mother was in my clinic on Friday and she had to make a choice between returning to work for a few hours a week or putting her child into a scheme that would cost her several hundred euro, and would cause her to lose family income support. Are we forcing people to make hard choices? There is also a real risk that child care facilities will close. We can discuss capital investment, but that will be no good when there is nobody to provide services.

We are making people struggle. The scheme is not working. We are creating, as Senator Bacik stated, a type of segregation. That is not good enough. Access and provision are important. Universality is the buzzword today in Irish politics. Let us not force parents to make choices regarding their children. Let us give our children every opportunity to have access to child care that is affordable and helps their development. If we do not, we are failing in our duty. Will the Minister of State give a commitment to this House to return with a review of the bands laid out in the current scheme?