Written answers

Wednesday, 13 May 2020

Department of Children and Youth Affairs

Childcare Services

Photo of Anne RabbitteAnne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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1089. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if community childcare services are advised by her Department or an agency acting on its behalf to send their staff home in circumstances in which the expected number of children do not present for their service. [3984/20]

Photo of Katherine ZapponeKatherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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My Department does not employ staff working in the early learning and care or school age childcare sector. Community based services, as with privately operated services, employ staff to provide services which may be subsidised under programmes funded by my Department.

With regard to the number of childcare practitioners required to be present in a service, the minimum adult to child ratios are clearly set out in Schedule 6 of the Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services) Regulations 2016.

I am not aware of any cases where a member of staff of my Department, or of an agency acting on behalf of my Department, would have cause to instruct a staff member to leave the premises due to the absence of expected children.

If the Deputy is aware of such an occurrence, I would welcome any information she could share with me.

My Department, through Pobal and the 30 City and County Childcare Committees, provides expert advice to services which are experiencing sustainability concerns. The Case Management services uses expert resources / tools to identify, in an evidence based manner, whether the service's business or service model is fit for purpose. The tools used may, for example, suggest that the service has too many staff for the number of children registered in any given term. This information is shared with the provider to assist them in their decision making and to assist with the sustainability of their service. It is a matter for the service to decide how to use the information, if at all. Once-off funding is also available to assist community services transition to a more sustainable footing.

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