Paul McGrath (Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Question 360: To ask the Minister for Social and Family Affairs the assistance which is available to persons who qualify for the back to education allowance to help them with child care costs; the schemes that exist for crèche supplements and the plans there are to expand these schemes. [26601/05]

Séamus Brennan (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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The back to education allowance is a second chance education opportunities programme designed to encourage and facilitate people on certain social welfare payments to improve their skills and qualifications and, therefore, their prospects of returning to the active work force.

The back to education allowance is essentially a social welfare replacement income support which is paid at a standard weekly rate equivalent to the maximum rate of the relevant social welfare income support that qualifies the applicant for participation in the scheme. The allowance also has a number of unique features attaching to it. It is payable for the duration of the course of study, which in some instances includes holiday periods. The scheme itself is not means tested and, consequently, participants may take up part-time employment without affecting their payment.

In addition, participants receive a cost of education allowance of €400 which is payable at the beginning of each academic year. Participants also retain entitlement to any secondary benefits they had while in receipt of the relevant social welfare payment that qualified them for participation in the scheme, subject to a means test.

The Department of Education and Science provide child care supports for people participating in certain educational programmes funded by VECs. In some cases, people accessing those programmes do so with the support of this Department's back to education allowance scheme. However, since its inception, child care support has never been a feature of the back to education allowance scheme per se. The question of such support to participants in receipt of the allowance would have significant cost implications and would have to be considered in the context of other supports such as those funded by the Department of Education and Science.

With regard to crèche supplements, these were introduced in some of the former health boards some years ago to provide individual assistance through the supplementary welfare allowance scheme to parents wishing to use crèches in certain circumstances. This arose, for example, where a parent would not be able to avail of necessary supports such as counselling services or addiction treatment programmes without assistance towards the cost of child-minding. They were never intended to be a long-term ongoing support for people returning to full-time education with the assistance of the back to education allowance.