Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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44. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the additional supports that will be extended to community child care facilities following recent changes whereby community employment workers are no longer counted as part of the child-staff ratio. [15224/17]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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It is my understanding that the Deputy is referring to the the Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services) Regulations 2016 which require that all staff members working directly with children in pre-school services must hold at least a major award in early childhood care and education at level 5 on the National Qualifications Framework, or a qualification deemed by the Minister to be equivalent. This requirement came into effect for newly-registering services on 30th June 2016 and for existing services on 31 December 2016.

The requirement that staff looking after young children have a qualification has been extensively welcomed as an important quality measure. In preparation for the implementation of the Regulations, Childcare Committees Ireland were commissioned by my Department to investigate the impact of the new childcare regulations on community childcare providers. All community services were afforded the opportunity to engage with the project.

The project indicated that the vast majority of services would not face financial hardship as a result of changes required under the regulations. However it did find that some services had come to rely on Community Employment scheme participants as part of core staff ratios.

In order to ensure that the regulatory change does not impact on service delivery or the availability of childcare places, I recently announced that €1m of additional funding will be made available to childcare providers who have been facilitating the training of Community Employment (CE) scheme participants.

I have made up to €2,000 available for services initially, to assist with the recruitment process or to provide expert support in HR management. After analysis of each service's financial situation, I will consider provision of limited funding to each service using the balance of the €1 million in sustainability funding I negotiated in Budget 2017 to ensure that they can fully meet the cost of these staff. No service will be forced to close.

Delivering high quality, accessible and affordable childcare is my key goal. I want to ensure that every child will be cared for by a qualified professional, and that services can sustain existing levels of provision, while they prepare for the new Affordable Childcare Scheme. This new scheme will be critical in providing an infrastructure for further investment in childcare. It will make childcare more affordable and will also assist with improving quality and sustainability.