Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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Question 89: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the number of crèches run by vocational education colleges that will close this year; the full list of VECs which are affected by these closures; the areas within each VEC that are affected; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24587/12]

Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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14 Vocational Education Committees (VECs) own crèches. In 2011, County Limerick VEC closed its créche. County Carlow VEC plans to close its créche in May and City of Dublin VEC will close its 3 créches in Ballyfermot, Cabra and Whitehall in July. County Clare VEC will close its créche in Ennis later this year but plans to keep its Kilrush créche open.

My Department continues to engage with the Irish Vocational Education Association (IVEA, on behalf of VECs), individual VECs and relevant employee representative organisations in relation to these issues.

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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Question 90: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the number of childcare places that will be lost as a result of the closure of a number of creches in vocational education colleges around the country this year; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24588/12]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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Childcare provision in creches owned by Vocational Education Committees (VECs) is mainly funded under the Childcare Education and Training Support (CETS) scheme The CETS is operated by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA) alongside a range of childcare schemes, such as ECCE and the Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) which are open on an equitable and nationally consistent basis to community crèches, including VEC crèches and in many cases to private providers.

Where VECs take the decision to close a creche, the places that were provided in that creche under the CETS can be made available to other local childcare services so there will be no reduction in the number of places available as a result of the closure of these créches.

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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Question 91: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the steps he is taking to ensure that creches in vocational education committees are not closed down; his views on the impact this will have on lone parents in disadvantaged areas returning to education. [24589/12]

Ciarán Cannon (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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Childcare provision in creches owned by Vocational Education Committees (VECs) is mainly funded under the Childcare Education and Training Support (CETS) scheme, which is operated by the Department of Children and Youth Affairs, under the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme (CCSS) framework. The CETS is targeted at participants in a range of further education and training programmes delivered by FÁS and VECs.

14 VECs own crèches and some of those VECs had been indicating that under CETS their crèches may not be financially viable in the long term, mainly because their operating costs were higher than those of commercial or community crèches (the levels of subvention under the CETS are in line with best practice as established by DCYA). My Department provided transitional core funding to support these creches in 2010 and in 2011 but I am not in a position to sustain this additional support in the long term.

Where VECs take the decision to close a creche, the places that were provided in that creche under the CETS can be made available to other local childcare services so there will be no loss in places as a result of the closure of these créches and no impact on lone parents in disadvantaged areas returning to education.