Gareth Scahill (Fine Gael)

The Minister of State is very welcome to the Chamber. I wish her the very best of luck in her new role. I congratulate her on that. She has always been a great supporter of this Chamber and someone who has always shown up. We hope we can rely on her to do the same in the future. I hope she does not forget her Roscommon roots if there are ever any favours I need called in as well.

Inclusion does not begin in the workplace; it begins in early childhood. If we are to be serious about building an inclusive society then we must ensure that children with disabilities can take part in the early childhood care and education, ECCE, programme not partially or conditionally but fully. The access and inclusion model, AIM, is central to that mission. It is an evidence-based model, evaluated independently, and it works. More than eight out of ten parents say it benefits their child, and providers overwhelmingly report that it strengthens inclusion in their settings. Budget 2026 showed the Government's commitment in real terms, with the AIM budget rising to €86 million, a 50% increase in just two years. That funding will support almost 9,000 children with disabilities next year in addition to the 2,000 already benefiting from AIM+, which extends targeted supports beyond the ECCE hours. The programme for Government also sets out a clear direction to examine and expand AIM and make it available to younger children. That commitment now needs to be carried through with urgency and ambition, because despite the investment and progress, too many families are still falling through the gaps.

I want to share an experience of one family who came to me recently. I will not use the child's name but their situation is, sadly, familiar to too many. Their weekly crèche fee is €170 and, for that, they receive up to 30 hours of childcare, with the ECCE providing a total of 45 hours per week. When their child was identified as having additional needs, the crèche reduced its childcare hours from 30 to 12, and because only 12 hours were now being provided, the crèche could only draw down 12 hours of the ECS grant. Its funding fell yet the fee charged to the parents remained exactly the same. This family is now paying more than €120 extra per month for less than half the childcare hours they had before. Like so many parents, often mothers, they have had to reduce their own working hours to fill that gap. The mother, in this case, works as an occupational therapist supporting children with additional needs, yet the AIM system does not support her own child to access the hours he needs. This is a policy unintentionally making workforce shortages worse in another critical sector and it is a reminder that inclusion must be more than a principle. It has to function in practice.

What this example shows is simple. Parents of children with additional needs are, in some cases, paying more and receiving less, not because services do not care but because the funding model does not align with the real hours children need. We now have an opportunity to fix this so I am calling for the following. We need a full and immediate review of the AIM flexibility. We need a model that supports full-day participation where required, not one that inadvertently incentivises limited hours. We also need full delivery of the programme for Government commitment to extend AIM to younger children. We need a clear timeline and we need actions and accountability on this. We must ensure that no family is ever put in a position where they are paying more for fewer hours simply because their child has additional needs. That is the opposite to inclusion. Inclusion must be embedded in the wider reform of early learning and childcare, including the expansion of State-led services and the additional 700 places planned for next year. These services must be inclusive by design and not retrofitted for inclusion later.

AIM is a strong model with strong outcomes. The direction of travel is right but families need the gap closed. Inclusion cannot be partial or limited by the hours on a funding form. It must be full, meaningful and available to every child. This is the standard we should set. It is the commitment we owe to families and it is what the expansion and enhancement of AIM must now deliver.