John Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail)
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613. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the cost of extending the early childhood care year hours from three hours a day to five hours; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31953/16]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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The Early childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme is currently operated for 15 hours per week, 38 weeks per year. To provide a pro-rata increase in capitation to pay for ten additional hours of ECCE per week, the weekly capitation payable would increase from €64.50 to €107.50 at the standard rate, and from €75 to €125 at the higher capitation rate.

The extra annual cost of such a measure, assuming take-up were to remain constant, would be €187.5m.

However such an increase would also result in significant additional costs that cannot be accurately calculated without further research - for example it would be required to provide a meal for children in care for 5 hours per day. Significantly also, it would no longer be possible for services to run two ECCE sessions per day, meaning that ECCE capacity would drop substantially. There would likely be capital costs incurred to construct new facilities to cater for children who can no longer be accommodated in 'afternoon' ECCE sessions in such a scenario.

At present, the goals of the ECCE free pre-school year can be fully met within a 15 hour weekly schedule. The extension of this programme on a universal basis, to 25 hours per week is not currently under consideration. Rather it is intended to focus additional funding on ensuring that lower income families can access affordable childcare.