Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

1298. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the financial supports available to parents that return to work regarding child care; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [13246/17]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

My Department currently provides childcare funding under the following programmes:

1. Early Years Care and Education (ECCE):

The ECCE programme provides free pre-school three hours per day, five days per week. From September 2016 children are eligible to start free pre-school once they turn 3 (and are not more than 4 years and 8 months), and can continue in free pre-school until they start primary school (once the child is not older than 5 years and 6 months at the end of the relevant pre-school year i.e. end June). Children are able to enrol in free pre-school at three different points in the year - September, January and April - so that they can access free pre-school as soon as possible after they reach the age of 3. Prior to Budget 2016, families benefitted from 38 weeks of free pre-school. This has now been increased to 61 weeks on average (ranging from 51 weeks to 88 weeks). It has been estimated that this 61 weeks of ECCE reduces parents childcare costs by €4,000 (per child).

2. Community Childcare Subvention (CCS):

The CCS Programme provides support for parents on various social protection payments, in low paid employment, and training or education, by enabling qualifying parents to avail of reduced childcare costs at participating community childcare services. A childcare funding subsidy is provided to childcare services and the parent pays the remainder of the services childcare fee. CCS is available through participating community not-for-profit childcare services and is also available through participating private providers through the CCS Private programme. The maximum subsidisation/payment per child, per week, is €95.00 (to be deducted from the weekly childcare fee).

3. Training and Employment Childcare (TEC) Programmes:

The objective of the TEC Programmes is to support parents on eligible training courses and eligible categories of parents returning to work, by providing subsidised childcare places. The TEC programmes are;

3.1. Childcare Education and Training Support programme (CETS). The CETS Programme formerly catered for FAS and VEC training course participants and now provides childcare on behalf of the Local Education and Training Boards.

3.2. After-School Child Care programme (ASCC). The ASCC is administered on behalf of the Department of Social Protection (DSP) and provides afterschool care for primary school children for certain categories of working parents and parents on DSP employment programmes (not including Community Employment).

3.3. Community Employment Childcare programme (CEC). The CEC is administered on behalf of DSP and provides childcare for children of parents who are participating on Community Employment schemes.

The Affordable Childcare Scheme (ACS) is due to be introduced later this year. It will subsume and replace all existing childcare programmes mentioned above, with the exception of the ECCE Programme, and will have both a universal and a targeted element. The universal element of the scheme will cater for all children between the ages of 6 to 36 months (or until the child qualifies for the free pre-school programme if later) who are availing of childcare by a Tusla registered childcare service. The targeted element of the scheme will cater for children aged from 6 months to 15 years. This element of the scheme will be means tested and will be based on a parent’s net income. This will be a progressive system that ensures that those on the lower end of the income scale will receive the greatest subsidy. I will be publishing information on this Scheme in the coming months.

It would be advisable for parents returning to work to contact DSP in relation to financial supports, if any, that they may be entitled to avail of from that Department.

In addition, parents may find it of value to contact their local City and County Childcare Committee for further information.