Tom Neville (Limerick County, Fine Gael)
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550. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the progress being made in relation to the reinstatement of the original promise of an extra preschool year for children with disabilities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [3023/18]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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I believe the question asked by the Deputy is in relation to a recent announcement that I would pause a decision on the overage exemption for the ECCE Programme, pending further consultation. 

Overage exemptions were introduced at the onset of the ECCE programme in 2010. At that time, the ECCE Programme only operated for a 38 week period, or one programme year.  For some children with special/additional needs, attending preschool five days a week was not feasible and so an allowance was made to enable them split ECCE over 2 years, for example, a child may have availed of 3 days ECCE provision in year one and 2 days in year two. Their total ECCE provision remained at 38 weeks.

In order to facilitate this, in the cases where the child would have been over the age limit for ECCE (5 years and 6 months when finishing ECCE) an overage exemption was approved. This flexibility was never intended to conflict with the legislative requirement to start school by age six. The law and policy on school start-age is clearly established in Ireland. Children should be in school by the time they are six and the primary school system has a variety of resources to support children with disabilities. If children are not in school by six, under the Educational Welfare Act, the Educational Welfare service of Tusla must be satisfied that the child is receiving a minimum standard of education in a place other than a recognised school. (Tusla does this by sending Educational Welfare Inspectors out to the place of the child's education. Should this be required, this would be in addition to the Early Years Inspectorates funded by my Department.)

Since ECCE was first introduced, my Department has worked to improve the pre-school experience for children with disabilities and to optimise their early development. The two main enhancements are:-

- ECCE entitlement currently averages at 61 weeks, up from 38 weeks, and it will expand further to 76 weeks from September 2018. This is in keeping with good international practice.

- The Access and Inclusion Model (AIM) has been introduced with 7 different levels of support for children with disabilities. Over 5,000 children have so far benefited from targeted supports and many multiples of this from universal supports available under AIM.

Purely in the best interests of children, and for no other reason, a proposal was considered to remove the overage exemption to the upper age limit to the Programme. On 6th December 2017, I announced that I paused a decision on the removal of the Upper age limit exemption for ECCE so that further consultation with parents can occur. This means that for the 2018/2019 ECCE year the overage exemption will continue to be available.  

In summary, from September 2018, all children, including children with disabilities will be able to access a full two years of ECCE.

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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551. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs when a person (details supplied) attending a preschool under the ECCE scheme will have a special needs assistant appointed for them through the better start access and inclusion model; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [3043/18]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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The Access and Inclusion Model (AIM) supports children with a disability to access and fully participate in the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme. It was introduced in June 2016 and is administered by Pobal on behalf of my Department. AIM includes 7 levels of progressive support, moving from the universal to the targeted. The degree of support provided depends on the needs and strengths of the child in the context of the pre-school setting they are attending.

A pre-school provider, in partnership with a parent, can apply for AIM Level 7 support - additional capitation. Where the AIM Early Years Specialist (EYS) (a support provided under AIM Level 4) considers that an AIM Level 7 support is critical to a child's participation in the ECCE programme, they will further consider the degree of Level 7 support required having regard to the needs of the child and the pre-school setting.

There are two rates of Level 7 capitation. The lower rate is €130 per week (which is calculated on the basis of 10 hours of support per week) and the higher rate is €195 per week (which is calculated on the basis of 15 hours of support per week). 

This additional capitation can be used to reduce the adult to child ratio in the pre-school room or can be used to buy in additional assistance.

In relation to this particular child, Pobal has advised that an application for support under AIM Level 7 was received on 16th January 2018.  An EYS has been assigned and will be in contact with the pre-school provider by telephone shortly to arrange for an observation visit to take place. Following this, the EYS will submit a recommendation to the Pobal AIM Level 7 appraisal team who will review this information and make a decision. The outcome of the application will then be communicated to the applicants. Pobal has advised that they would expect a turnaround of between 4 and 6 weeks from receipt of the application to communication of the decision to this child's parents and pre-school provider.