Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Labour Party for this motion. I am taking this on behalf of the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman. I will actually stick to the script. I have a big interest in this area and a lot to say on it but I have to say what the Minister wants said first. If time allows, I will then come in myself. It was a really good and rich debate and I have opinions on it, which I will not be shy about sharing.

This timely motion from the Labour Party is a welcome opportunity to debate the important issue of early learning and childcare. An amendment to this motion is being tabled. While there is agreement on long-standing challenges in early learning and childcare, we also believe that the extensive commitments by this Government to address these long-standing challenges and the substantial progress we have made is delivering real, substantive, and sustained change. We are substantially reducing out-of-pocket costs of early learning and childcare for families; ensuring the supply of early learning and childcare places is meeting demand; increasing the pay and improving the working conditions of early years educators and school-age childcare practitioners; improving the quality of children's early learning experiences; and placing early learning and childcare providers on a solid, sustainable footing. We have backed up our commitments with significant new investment, which is set to exceed €1 billion in 2023, exceeding the investment target set out in First 5, five years ahead of schedule. We have used this investment to introduce a new funding model that has been designed to address the most challenging issues this sector faces. This funding model recognises early learning and childcare as a public good that demands more investment and involvement by the State and a closer working partnership with providers, with new responsibilities on both sides.

The new funding model, Together for Better, was launched by the Minister in September. Together for Better brings together three major programmes, namely, the ECCE programme, including the access and inclusion model, the national childcare scheme and the new core funding scheme, with a further programme, Tackling Disadvantage, under development. The ECCE programme enjoys uptakes rates in excess of 95% and has removed barriers to accessing preschool education, with data from Growing Up in Ireland showing that more than 60% of low-income families would not have been able to send their child to preschool without this programme. This motion suggests that participation rates of children in the north east inner city fall far short of uptake rates nationally. This is not borne out in the data we hold, which show uptake rates comparable to the national average. Work is under way to enhance the ECCE programme, with an independent evaluation now under way by Stranmillis University as a precursor to putting the ECCE programme on a statutory footing.The award winning Access and Inclusion Model, AIM, is supporting more than 5,000 children with a disability each year to access the Early Childhood Care and Education, ECCE, programme. A commitment has already been made to enhance and expand AIM, following the completion of the AIM evaluation due to be published in early 2023.

The national childcare scheme, NCS, which was introduced in late 2019 is undergoing major reform. Two significant changes to NCS were introduced as part of budget 2022. The practice of deducting hours spent in preschool or school from the entitlement to the NCS subsidised hours came to an end, benefitting up to 5,000 disadvantaged children; and the universal subsidy was extended to all children under 15 years old who were using registered early learning and childcare. Additional funding of €121 million for the NCS was secured in budget 2023 to increase the universal subsidy from 2 January and to further reduce out of pocket costs of early learning and childcare to families. In parallel, there is work under way to implement the National Action Plan for Childminding, with a commitment to opening the NCS to childminders at the earliest possible opportunity.

This evening's motion refers to outdated OECD data that places Ireland as the second highest across the organisation when it comes to net childcare costs as a share of the household's net income. It is important to draw attention to the latest OECD data that show that Ireland has had the highest decrease in early learning and childcare costs to families across the EU over the period 2019-2021; and net childcare costs as a share of the household's net income for lone parents on low income in 2021 have fallen below the EU average for the first time.

Importantly, the latest OECD does not take account of enhancements to the NCS introduced in the last two budgets. The new core funding scheme, with an allocation of €259 million in its first year and participation rates of 94% services has supported the following. The historic employment regulation orders for the early years services sector, which came into effect in September of this year, provided for new minimum hourly rates of pay for early years educators and school-age childcare practitioners and increased the wages of an estimated 73% of those working in the sector; the introduction of a new fee management system which means initially no increase in fees from September 2021 for the September 2022 to August 2023 programme year, which, in tandem with developments to the NCS, will deliver enormous benefits to families; the introduction of a requirement of services to offer the NCS to eligible families, which has given rise to a 10% increase in the number of services offering the NCS, thus substantially widening access to this State support; a significant growth in capacity allowing greater access for children and their families, as demonstrated by a 16% increase in place hours between 2019 and 2020; an increase in place hours where there is lower supply and higher demand, including baby place hours which were increased by 8%, and toddler place hours which were increased by 22%; and increased school-age place hours and opening hours both in term and out of term-time.

The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, has secured addition funding of €28 million in budget 2023 for year two of core funding, €4 million of which will be used to remove the experience requirement on both graduate premiums under core funding, with the allocation of the remaining €24 million to be determined by evidence. Among the evidence that will inform this allocation is an independent review of the finances of small, sessional services that the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, has committed to concluding in quarter 1 of 2023 in recognition of the concerns expressed by some small, sessional providers.

There is also work under way to develop the new tackling disadvantage fund, whereby services will be provided with a proportionate mix of universal and targeted supports to support children and families accessing their services who are experiencing disadvantage. The provision of hot meals in early learning and childcare is currently being piloted as one potential support.

The Opposition refers in its motion to the lack of Government and State agency intervention and supports to ensure the availability of sufficient places. We do not accept this. Since 2015, the Government has funded the creation of more than 27,000 new places through an annual capital programme. This built on significant State capital investment under the Equal Opportunities Childcare Programme 2000–2006 and the National Childcare Investment Programme 2006-2013 that funded the creation of 65,000 places representing approximately 40% of all places. Moreover, Government has allocated €70 million under the National Development Plan for the building blocks capital programme, with the majority of this funding earmarked for new places. Capital funding coupled with the success of core funding in increased capacity shows Government has been proactive in the area of supply management and has committed to further action, including working with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage to update planning guidelines for early learning and childcare.

I said at the outset that Government agrees that the sector needs real and sustained reform. We are working to reshape early learning and childcare, changing the current relationship between the State and the provider to one of a partnership working together to deliver the public good. We have delivered unprecedented levels of State funding and have committed to doing more next year. The Government wants Ireland to have a world-class early learning and childcare sector. We have a roadmap to get there, have put the funding on the table to achieve it and have marked major milestones. By working in partnership with the sector, I believe we can achieve this goal.

I apologise that I never lifted my head while I was reading. I decided I would keep going. To be fair to the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, since coming into office, he has put childcare front and centre. We can see that with the level of funding allocated. I know from his budgetary negotiation this year that he was relentless in ensuring more funds were put into core funding and that he would deliver on that, which he did. Notwithstanding that, Senator Sherlock and the Labour Party have put forward extremely valuable contributions as has everybody else. We all agree here that we are trying to catch up at pace to ensure there is choice, affordability and capacity in the system. Capacity is one of the biggest issues and that is not just in the baby room but all the way through.

I served on the city and county childcare committee in Galway back in the day and I also managed a childcare service for three years, so I speak with a bit of knowledge of the space. To be quite honest, back in the day and I am not talking 100 years ago but in 2011, if a new provider came into the area, the city and county childcare committee members did not want to displace anybody but at the same time they were not looking at the growth in population or where the numbers on the census were at. They had a particular role to play but at the same time capacity was not being built and that is why there is a shortfall. There is no denying it whatsoever. There are children who cannot access childcare spaces. It took me a second to understand what was being saying about the one- or two-bedroom apartments where as part of the building guidelines there were no plans to ensure crèche were provided on-site. That again was a missed opportunity in a particular location and people ended up travelling as a result.

I remember one of the best parliamentary questions I ever put was when I asked a question about how many registered childminders we had. I always remember it was 172 then and it has not improved much since. I am delighted to see that the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, is putting a great focus on childminding because what people need is choice and flexibility. That has to come into it. All of us ladies who might have children at home tonight, need that flexibility of a childminder who can be a day parent. I think that is a great phrase and had not heard it until tonight - the day parent piece. We need that flexibility. What children also need - and Senator Carrigy spoke about this - is consistency. If you have a child with additional needs, they really need consistency. That is why I lean more to the State model completely because that is where the consistency, the continuum of care and understanding the child is as well as putting them at the centre. Perhaps when we want to be really bold and ambitious, and when all Departments are working collaboratively and building new schools, we should not be displacing the childcare providers as was the case, but ensuring space is provided for them on the campus to meet the early childcare needs.We must be bold and ambitious and all Departments must work together collaboratively. When we are building new schools we should not be displacing the childcare provider, as in the case the Senator mentioned. Rather, we should ensure there is space provided on the campus so we can meet the early needs requirements. We also must look at the additional needs in the same vein and it must all be an inclusive space. While I might be from Galway and I do not understand the challenges that are faced in areas of deprivation as well as the Senator does, we also need to understand how that inclusive community works. I know that in some places and situations the best place for a child is the childcare setting. That is the sad reality of it in some cases. We need to ensure those settings exist, that they are easy to access and are in areas with the right wraparound supports. In that case it is not just the child who needs the support; it is the mum, the family and all of us who need it.

Childcare has come a long way because Senator Warfield and I were on the Committee on Children and Youth Affairs, along with Deputy Sherlock. We put a lot of time into that committee and a lot of good and heavy lifting was done there. That has enabled the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman. Committees do good work and childcare was front and centre of that committee. The weight of support came out of that committee. The Government has done a lot and the Minister has done phenomenal work in this space. However, we still have a distance to travel on it. As a collective, we can travel that distance and we need to balance the four pillars. The Senator was telling me about public childcare; the cost of childcare; early years; and the ails of ECCE. We must have an integrated approach. That should be the ambition and I thank the Senator for giving me the opportunity to listen to the debate.