Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Labour Party motion. Naturally, I do not agree with everything the proposers said. That is the nature of our different positions. However, the motion gives us an opportunity to highlight important areas that need change and intervention.

We have been on a trajectory for a number of years in the childcare and early years sector. It was the Cinderella sector for a very long time and there was a perception of childminding rather than the real childcare professionals there who have a passion for children. They identify issues very early with children and are an incredible support to parents in steering them through and assisting them in new parenthood, toilet training and so many other areas in which they will advise and, because of their education, be a great resource for parents. The preschool regulations of 2016 brought us to a place where there was a standard of education across the entire childcare sector. While at the time I advocated for a grandfathering aspect because we lost some people who would not return to education but had years of experience, by having a standard of education and input into the training and education of our childcare professionals, we afford an opportunity for universal experience for every child regardless of where he or she goes to a childcare service. That was very important.

We then saw the introduction of the ECCE scheme. Once my daughter applied for that, we went from more than €1,200 a month in childcare costs down to €900-odd. That made a huge financial difference to us at the time. From that, which came from my Fine Gael colleagues in the previous Government, we have come forward and seen the introduction of the national childcare scheme and its previous manifestations of childcare subvention that have ensured hard-pressed parents have had options for quite some time now. We are increasing that trajectory. We are at a place of record sums being put into childcare.

However, there is no doubt there is an ongoing issue for childcare providers, and these things must be addressed. The baby places have always been a struggle. There are a multiplicity of factors feeding into that. The first is the ratio of 3:1. That single worker must have breaks under the Organisation of Working Time Act and they must take holidays. Therefore, more than one worker is needed and there must be floating workers.