Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Cathaoirleach on his election and express my sympathies regarding the recent outrage in Orlando.I ask the Leader to invite the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs to come to the House to debate the crisis in child care. There is a massive crisis in child care, at the root of which is funding. As an illustration of how bad the funding situation is, as a percentage of GDP, we spend 0.2% on child care. We are not just at the bottom of the European league; we are at the bottom by a million miles. The next worst is the UK, which spends four times as much. It is clear we are in trouble when the Tory Government spends four times as much as our Government on child care. Three crèches have closed in Limerick in the past week. In one case, at Tic Toc crèche in Westbury, the workers had to sit in to get their rights with regard to redundancy payment. At the heart of the crisis is funding. The typical pay for a child care worker is €9.80 per hour. That is how little we value child care here, despite all the rhetoric, and is an indictment of the last Government and previous Governments for the past ten or 20 years. That it was not addressed during the Celtic tiger period is an absolute disgrace. Child care workers at the front line are voting with their feet. People who are qualified with doctoral and master's degrees are leaving to take up child care posts in America, Britain and other countries where they are paid properly. We need a debate on this issue. We need to address the crisis. I am proud to be a member of SIPTU, which is working hard to address this with its Big Start campaign. SIPTU deserves support and recognition from the Department. The workers who are at the front line need to be at the heart of the solution to our child care crisis. I would appreciate if that request could be made.