Dominic Hannigan (Meath East, Labour)
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551. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if there are any exceptions to be granted for a child who was born five hours after the deadline for the free ECCE places; the person that needs to be contacted; the information necessary if an exception were to be granted; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [16675/14]

Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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The Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme provides a free pre-school year to all eligible children.

Children are eligible to avail of the free pre-school year where they are aged more than 3 years 2 months and less than 4 years 7 months at 1 September in the relevant year. Children born between 2 February 2010 and 30 June 2011 will qualify for the free pre-school year in September 2014 and children born between 2 February 2011 and 30 June 2012 will qualify for the programme in September 2015.

Therefore, children born in July 2011 are below the age range for eligibility for the programme in the school year 2014/15, but will qualify in the school year 2015/16. There is no provision under the programme to enrol children who are below the qualifying age.

The objective of the ECCE programme is to make early learning in a formal setting available to eligible children in the year before they commence primary school. To achieve this, services participating in the pre-school year are expected to provide age-appropriate activities and programmes to children within a particular age cohort. For this reason, it is appropriate to set minimum and maximum limits to the age range within which children will qualify.