Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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The Access and Inclusion Model remains a significant policy initiative of my Department and since the launch of the scheme in 2016, over 12,500 children in over 3,300 services nationally have benefited directly from targeted supports.

For the 2020 budget process, I succeeded in securing a further €10 million in funding for AIM supports bringing the total AIM budget to €43 million for 2020.

Following the closure of creches and pre-schools due to the Covid-19 pandemic, existing funding schemes including ECCE and AIM were paused. In addition to a range of financial supports that are available for businesses across the economy, I introduced the Temporary Wage Subsidy Childcare Scheme to support early learning and care and school-age childcare settings to remain viable and continue to pay staff wages with a view to retaining their workforce and allowing for as smooth a transition as possible when reopening services from June 29^th.

The ECCE programme, which the Access and Inclusion Model supports, will recommence from the end of August. Detailed planning for the reopening of ECCE and AIM will be finalised in the coming weeks. In the interim, early learning and care providers have already been invited to submit applications for AIM supports for the 2020-21 programme year, to enable supports to be available with the least possible delay when the ECCE scheme recommences.