Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

874. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the number of early years professionals by grade who earned below the living wage in 2019. [15784/20]

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

875. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the estimated cost of raising the rate of pay of early years professionals to at least the living wage of €12.30 per hour. [15785/20]

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

876. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the estimated cost of raising the rate of pay of all early years professionals to at least €15 per hour. [15786/20]

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

879. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the staff turnover rate in full day care services per year. [15789/20]

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

880. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the staff turnover rate in the early years sector per year. [15790/20]

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

881. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the number of early years services that have a staff turnover rate greater than 80% per year. [15791/20]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I propose to take Questions Nos. 874 to 876, inclusive, and 879 to 881, inclusive, together.

According to the Living Wage Technical Group, the "living wage" in Ireland in 2019 was €12.30 per hour. Although the average wage in the Early Learning and Care sector in 2019 was €12.55, as per Pobal’s Annual Early Years Sector Profile Report for the 2018/2019 programme year, wages vary, particularly according to staff role in the service.

The table, taken from Pobal’s Annual Early Years Sector Profile Report for 2018/2019, shows the average wages of early learning and care practitioners in 2019 by job description and qualification level.

As the State is not the employer, my Department does not determine the wages of staff working in early learning and care settings. However, based on figures available to my Department, of approximately 26,000 staff working directly with children, it is estimated that 60% (or 15,600) are paid below €12.30 per hour and 40% (or 10,400) are paid €12.30 or more. It is estimated that 83% (or 21,647) of staff working directly with children are paid below €15 hour per hour and 17% (or 4,353) are paid €15 hour or more hour.

On this basis, it can be estimated that the annual cost of raising the wages of all early learning and care practitioners to at least €12.30 per hour would be approximately €30 million. This figure represents an average increase of 12% in gross pay. The additional cost to employers for this in terms of employer PRSI and holiday pay would be €6m – bringing the total cost to €36m.

The annual cost of paying €15 hour per hour to staff currently paid below this rate is estimated to be €103 million. This estimate assumes that the number of hours worked remains unchanged and represents an average increase of 30% in gross pay. The additional cost to employers for this in terms of Employer PRSI and holiday pay would be €21m – bring a total cost of this to €124m.

The average overall turnover rate for full-time only services per year is as follows:

- 2018/2019 – 40.17%

- 2017/2018 – 46.37%

- 2016/2017 – 36.79%

According to Pobal’s Annual Early Years Sector Profile Report for the 2018/2019 programme year, the average overall turnover rate was 23.4%. When broken down, this shows that 20% of services lost 1 member of staff, 14% lost 2 or 3 members of staff and a further 7% lost more than 3 staff members. It is important to note that 59% of services retained all of their staff members.

For the 2017/2018 programme year the figures are similar. In that year, the overall turnover rate was 24.7%, with 23% of services losing 1 member of staff, 14% losing 2 or 3 members of staff and 6% losing more than 3 staff. In this year, 57% of services indicated that they retained all of their staff.

For the year 2016/2017, the overall turnover rate was 28.2%, showing that the overall turnover rate has improved slightly. A breakdown of the figures for this year is not available. Further, there is no similar data on previous programme years.

In terms of the percentage of services who recorded a staff turnover rate greater than 80% per year, this data is not available but would be highly dependent on the size of each service. Such a rate would be outside the average rates which are more representative of the overall situation experienced in the sector.

Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

877. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the total income for the early years' sector from State spending and parental spending. [15787/20]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

My Department does not record parental spending in the early years sector.

Data from the Independent Review of the Costs indicates that approximately, 42% of service income is from parental fees with the remainder (i.e. 58%) of income provided by the State.

My Department funds childcare providers through subsidy and grant schemes. The subsidy schemes, which are administered by Pobal, include ECCE, the National Childcare Scheme, CCSP and TEC. In addition, Programme Support Payments are made to providers each year, based on the number of children they have registered on each scheme. Capital grants are available annually, and providers are invited to apply for a grant under a competitive process.

All schemes, other than the capital grant programme, are operated on a programme year basis, which opens in late August. The 2018/19 Programme year ran from 27 August 2018 to 23 August 2019. The capital grant programme is operated on a calendar year basis.

For the 2018 /19 programme year, the last programme year for which full information is available, the total income paid to childcare providers under all Department funding schemes and programmes was €488.6million. As the budget for childcare increased in 2019/ 2020, and the number of services remained relatively stable, this amount will have increased. It is important to draw attention to the wide range which lies behind the average; the range varies from services with less than 10 part-time children to services with over 200 children, many of whom are full time.

Separate data has indicated that, on average, services receive 78% of their income from the State (this includes a large number of services which are ECCE only). Data also indicates that of all income earned by providers in the sector, 58% comes from the State, with the balance coming from parental income. This data is based on 2017/ 2018 income and both State investment and parental fees have risen since then.