Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)
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There is a slight change in the running order, so the first Commencement matter will be from Senator Gareth Scahill.

Gareth Scahill (Fine Gael)
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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.

Victor Boyhan (Independent)
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I warmly welcome the Minister of State and congratulate her. I know she is already a Minister of State but she has been elevated to a Minister of State attending Cabinet. I wish her well tomorrow, which I think is her first day, but I may be wrong on that. I also welcome the guests of Senator Joe O’Reilly: Darragh Kiernan and Conor Madden. Conor is a Cavan GAA intercounty player, but I have been told both of them are distinguished GAA players. That is the strong endorsement that has come from Senator O'Reilly.

Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Cathaoirleach for his warm wishes. I welcome everybody in the Gallery, and particularly Seán Keane, a transition year student who is working with me this week, and who is here to make sure I do a good job on this Commencement matter.

At the outset, I wish to say I am taking this on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Foley. The Minister thanks Senator Scahill for raising this really important issue, and offering me the opportunity to respond on her behalf. Since 2016, as the Senator is aware, the access and inclusion model, AIM, has had a major impact on the lives of children with disabilities and the overall quality of learning and care. The Senator himself cited the statistic that 82% of parents and carers reported that AIM has benefited their child. It has been such a widely welcomed and much-needed support for families up and down the country, including, of course, in Roscommon. More than 35,000 children have received more than 80,000 targeted supports across 4,800 early learning and care services nationwide.

The 2025 budget allocation for the access and inclusion model, AIM, was €80.9 million, which represented a 41% increase on the 2024 allocation. This significant increase reflected the Government's ongoing commitment to supporting children with disabilities and additional needs to meaningfully participate in early learning and care. The 2026 budget, which we just passed recently, further increases AIM funding to €86.5 million. That will ensure continued expansion and sustainability of supports for children, parents, carers and, of course, service providers.

AIM funding provides a suite of universal and targeted supports across seven levels. The universal supports are designed to create a more inclusive culture in early learning and care settings, through training courses and qualifications for staff. Where universal supports are not enough to meet the needs of an individual child, targeted supports are available. These include things like equipment, therapeutic supports, the facilitation of a lower ratio of children to staff in preschool rooms, or funding for an extra staff member as a shared resource where a child with additional needs is present.

Access to AIM is based on the needs of the individual child. In the context of a preschool setting, that means they do not require a diagnosis. In line with the commitment in First 5, a whole-of-government strategy for babies, young children and their families for 2019 to 2028, an independent evaluation of AIM was undertaken in order to inform an extension of AIM beyond the early childhood care and education, ECCE, programme as well as any potential enhancements to the model. This is the review and extension the Senator called for and is something the Government is absolutely committed to.

AIM has, as the Senator is aware, expanded beyond time spent in the ECCE programme, allowing children access to AIM targeted supports for an additional three hours a day during ECCE term and six hours outside of the ECCE term. The programme for Government, as the Senator campaigned for, commits to examining and expanding the AIM model and making it available to younger children. Officials in the Department are currently considering the policy implications and appropriate mechanisms to extend AIM to children aged under three. It is critical that any extension of AIM supports for this cohort are evidence-based and reflective of their needs. It is intended that, over time, all children with additional needs registered in the early learning and care services will have access to supports under AIM. It is therefore intended to also give consideration at a later date to an extension of AIM to children attending school-age childcare. Such an extension will also need to meet the different needs of children in the older age cohort. Both extensions will obviously require additional funding through the annual budget process.

Senator Scahill referenced a family he is working with, where the mam is an occupational therapist providing much-needed services to children and, perhaps, even adults right across her CHO level.The Senator raised a really important point. The childcare hours of some families in that situation are unfortunately reduced as a direct correlation in relation to their needs. I thank the Senator for raising and escalating this issue here today. As I said, the AIM is under review and this is something I will definitely take back to the Minister, Deputy Foley.

Gareth Scahill (Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister of State. In relation to the AIM programme, 69% of participants saw an improvement in peer interaction and more than 95% of providers reported a positive impact on inclusion. That is what we want to see. I did, however, highlight that in some cases parents of children with additional needs are paying more and receiving less. That is an anomaly that we cannot stand over and one that we need to address.

In my first call, I asked that the review include AIM's flexibility, so that the Minister would be flexible and that when I raise this issue, I would not get a traditional piece of correspondence that does not reference the individual case. The flexibility should be there to take on board the individual situation like this where the mother is an occupational therapist and we need her working. I would appreciate it if flexibility could be built into it.

Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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That is a really worthwhile idea to explore. Based on the evaluation, and the Senator read out some of the statistics that came from that evaluation, AIM is now being extended on a phased basis as funding becomes available. As a first step in this extension, since the beginning of September last year, all AIM-targeted supports have been available to ECCE children beyond the time they spent in the ECCE programme. It is intended that over time all children with additional needs in early learning and childcare services will have access to supports under AIM.

The next phase of expansion focuses on a redesign of AIM for children under three to meet the specific needs of the younger age cohort. I am not sure if that is the age cohort of the family in question that the Senator raised this issue for, but the design of AIM will ensure that it meets the different needs of children in different cohorts. That will depend on the funding secured through the annual budget process, but we are on a good trajectory for funding. I spoke about the increases in funding this year and last.

An action plan has also been developed to respond to other areas of improvement identified through that AIM evaluation. That includes things like increasing awareness and the streamlining of application processes.

Victor Boyhan (Independent)
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I thank the Minister of State for her time. It is greatly appreciated.