Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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613. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the source of the figure he cited on a programme (details supplied) on RTE that there are 10,000 vacant and unoccupied places in preschools; if it comes from the latest annual Pobal survey in 2014, his views that this survey's statistics are not a reliable indicator of free capacity in the preschool sector, given that they come from a single survey that will be two to three years old when the early childhood care and education scheme expansion takes place in September 2016; and his plans for undertaking a more comprehensive, contemporaneous and reliable survey of capacity in the preschool sector prior to implementing the expansion of the scheme. [37238/15]

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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The figure of 10,000 vacancies was derived from the Annual Survey of the Early Years Sectors, which was conducted by Pobal on behalf of my Department. This survey, which was conducted in December 2014 and its findings published in July of this year, yielded a response rate of almost 64 percent.

The figure of 10,000 vacancies represents a conservative estimate of the number of vacancies for sessional services across the country and takes account of national waiting lists figures.

The estimated number of all vacancies in early years services in December 2014 stood at 31,146. 15,737 of these vacancies were for sessional services. When the estimated number of children on a waiting list was taken into account (i.e. 6,912 on a waiting list, of which 2,687 were on a waiting list for a sessional service), the actual number of vacancies for all services and for sessional services only were actually 24,234 and 13,050 respectively.

The expansion of the free pre-school programme is expected to increase the number of children benefiting from around 67,000 to around 127,000, however the higher level of participation will not arise until April 2017.

In order to provide the sector with the time to expand provision to meet demand, a decision was made to implement the new measures from September 2016. This timeframe will allow pre-school providers to make any necessary infrastructural or service changes and to put in place extra staff resources to accommodate the additional demand. The City and County Childcare Committees will be in a position to help parents identify pre-school providers within their area with sufficient capacity to enrol additional children.