Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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214. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the early learning and care services that are in receipt of the graduate premium for lead educators and the graduate premium for graduate managers; and the sum allocated to each service, in tabular form. [47748/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Services with Early Learning and Care (ELC) graduate Lead Educators/Managers will receive an additional allocation through the ELC Graduate and Manager Premiums where they apply.

In order for a service to be allocated an ELC Graduate Premium, the Lead Educator in an ELC room and/or the Manager of an ELC or a combined ELC and School Age Childcare (SAC) service and must hold an appropriate qualification (QQI Level 7 or higher) as per the Department’s Higher Capitation Qualifications list. They must also have a minimum of three years’ experience in the sector.

The ELC Graduate Premium is calculated based on the number of ELC graduate Lead Educators in ELC rooms and the hours that they lead in those rooms; and if the ELC or combined ELC and SAC service has an ELC graduate as the manager, the premium is calculated on the hours the Graduate Manager works or the hours of operation of the service whichever is the lesser.

The definition of a Lead Educator is taken from ‘Nurturing Skills – The Workforce Plan for Early Learning and Care and School-Age Childcare, 2022-2028’: “An Early Years Educator who leads practice with a group of children will be termed ‘Lead Educator’. The term ‘Lead Educator’ is used to reflect the important pedagogical leadership role played by these individuals with a group of children and with other Early Years Educators who are also working with that group of children. For the purposes of Core Funding, each ELC room can only have one Lead Educator at any one time; even if the children are organised into groups within the room.

The definition of a Manager is also taken from Nurturing Skills – The Workforce Plan for Early Learning and Care and School-Age Childcare, 2022-2028’: “The term Manager is used in the Workforce Plan to refer to the person in charge of a setting, as defined in the Early Years Regulations 2016 and SAC Regulations 2018, i.e. ‘the person who has day-to-day charge of the service’. This person may or may not be the Registered Provider. While ELC and SAC services vary considerably in their legal and organisational structures, every service must – as a condition of its registration – have a designated person in charge (here termed the ‘Manager’) who is responsible for the daily running of the service and – unless deputised by a named person – must be on the premises at all times when the service is being carried on.” The Core Funding Graduate Manager premium can only be attracted by this designated person in charge, not by any of the other members of staff who may deputise when the manager is not present.

Attached is a list of services contracted into Core Funding and the amount of funding they are expected to receive under the Graduate Premium and the Manager Premium, and the sum total of these two premiums. This data capture was taken on the 27th of September 2022. This list does not contain services that have submitted applications but have not yet contracted nor services with applications in draft. 

Where services have graduate Lead Educators or graduate Managers, details and evidence of the qualifications of these staff are required in order to pay the graduate premium part of Core Funding. The process of appraising this evidence is ongoing. Although the final calculation will be subject to appraisal of any accompanying evidence submitted with it, payments are being made on a provisional basis using the results of this calculation while the appraisal process takes place.

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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215. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth his plans to make public the list of signatories to the new core funding model; and the consequences for organisations that sign up to the scheme but do not pass on the benefit of a fee freeze to parents. [47750/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Affordable, accessible, high-quality and sustainable early learning and childcare is a key priority for Government,as demonstrated in the recent investment exceeding €1 billion in Budget 2023.

In December 2021, Government adopted the 25 recommendations contained in an Expert Group report, Partnership for the Public Good: A New Funding Model for Early Learning and Care (ELC) and School-Age Childcare (SAC). The new funding model, Together for Better, including Core Funding, the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) and ECCE, incorporating the Access and Inclusion Model (AIM), will support delivery of ELC and SAC for the public good, for quality and affordability for children, parents and families.

Core Funding, which began in September, is the new funding stream with an allocation of €266million in 2023 to start this partnership for the public good between the State and providers. Its primary purpose is to improve pay and conditions in the sector as a whole and improve affordability for parents as well as ensuring a stable income to providers. 

A central condition of Core Funding is that providers agree not to increase fees above those which were charged last year. Providers who had increased their fees since September are required to revert to September 2021 levels under Core Funding from the point of coming into contract for the scheme. This gives parents greater certainty about what they will be charged and ensures that the significant increases to NCS subsidies are not absorbed by fee increases. The approach to fee management will be developed further over time.

Participation in the Core Funding is optional and, to date, 90% of services are signed-up and thereby agreeing to operating the fee conditions. The full list of participating Partner Services is available here: first5fundingmodel.gov.ie/together-for-better/

The Core Funding Partner Service Funding Agreement outlines the terms and conditions of the Grant, including specific clauses on Fee Management. The Funding Agreement is publicly available here: first5fundingmodel.gov.ie/core-funding/

The Funding Agreement states clearly that failure to comply with the terms of the Agreement may result in a service's exclusion from the Grant, suspension of the Grant, and/or a termination of the Agreement, including remedy of breaches or refund of any excess charges to families.

I encourage any parent or provider who has queries in relation to Core Funding to contact their local City/County Childcare Committee for support and guidance at: myccc.ie/