Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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549. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the options available to a preschool (details supplied) in terms of getting additional space for 2023. [51126/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Last month, I was pleased to announce a €10m Capital Grant for the Early Learning and Childcare Sector. The Building Blocks - Improvement Grant is part of a wider Building Blocks Capital Programme for Early Learning and Childcare under the National Development Plan.

Grants will range from €35,000 to €75,000 across two separate strands: Green Energy and Retrofit. The Green Energy Strand/Strand A will support the Climate Action Agenda and the Programme for Government, which aim to transition to a carbon neutral economy by the end of 2050 and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 51% by 2030.

Services that sign up for the Core Funding Scheme are eligible for funding under for the Building Blocks - Capital Programme. Applications from eligible services will be accepted in Q4 2022 and successful applicants will be notified in early 2023.

The grant scheme is part of a wider Building Blocks Capital Programme designed to meet current and long-term Early Learning and Childcare infrastructure needs – with details of a €45m Building Blocks - Capacity Grant and a €15m Building Blocks - Innovation Grant to be announced in the coming months.

My Department advises the services to contact their local County Childcare Committees, who will provide information on this capital scheme in the coming months.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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550. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the supports that he can make available to ECCE providers in respect of the administrative burden that the Hive hub presents to end users. [51132/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The Hive is part of the new Early Years Platform which Pobal uses to administer various Early Learning and Childcare Schemes. It is a self-service portal which has been designed to meet the current and future needs of providers in an accessible and intuitive manner.

On an annual basis, up to 200,000 children are registered on the Early Years Platform for the NCS and ECCE.

The Early Years Platform is relatively new and as with any new IT system, it takes time to bed in for all parties. This September, another major new component, Core Funding, was added to the Hive. I am aware that the addition of this major component may have affected response times and user experience on the Hive, and that this came at a very busy and challenging time for the sector. My officials continue to work with Pobal, the scheme administrator, to identify potential issues and mitigate any problems during future peak periods of activity on the Hive.

In December 2021, I announced major reforms to the funding model for early learning and childcare services. That month, 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)”

Recommendation 2 states that the new Core Funding stream should incorporate funding for administration and to support the employment of graduate staff. Core Funding is underpinned by the Employment Regulation Orders, and 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.

While Core Funding operates in addition to and alongside the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) and the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme, including the Access and Inclusion Model (AIM), it replaces ECCE higher capitation and incorporates funding previously allocated to the discretionary Programme Support Payments (PSP) from September 2022.

Pobal continues to provide support and assistance directly to early learning and childcare providers through their dedicated Early Years Provider Centre. There is a dedicated suite of training aids and reference material, including videos, available on The Hive to assist users.

My Department has engaged with Pobal on continued enhancements to the system to ensure it is responsive to early learning and childcare providers' business needs. Pobal is also arranging to engage with system users to see where further training or support may be required.

Providers experiencing issues using the Hive can also avail of assistance from the City and County Childcare Committees who are funded by my Department to provide supports directly to providers in their area, including one-to-one guidance, and training via a dedicated training platform for the Hive users.

I am further advised by my officials that they will also be engaging with all key stakeholders to explore how the system may be further enhanced to minimise administrative burden on providers as additional supports for families and the sector come on stream.

I would note that my Department has commenced a review of the ECCE programme which is expected to be completed by Q3 2023. The review will assess whether the ECCE Programme is meeting its core objectives and will identify any changes or improvements that can be made to the Programme, based on international evidence, experience to date as well as consultation from a wide number of stakeholders.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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551. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he has conducted a data protection impact analysis in respect of the HIVE system for the ECCE service; and if he will clarify whether his Department is the controller or processor of data in respect of the HIVE system. [51133/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The Department conducted a Privacy Impact Assessment on the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) scheme in December 2016. This PIA was undertaken by a third party - Sytorus. The PIA is a process used to protect privacy by design when an organisation starts or acquires a new business, implements a new process, or launches a new product. The Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) is an on-going process, regularly applied to personal data processing, identifying, and mitigating risks.

As the PIA was conducted prior to the GDPR coming into effect in May 2017, the Department was under no obligation to conduct a DPIA, but nonetheless conducted the PIA on ECCE as this was best practice in relation to new and existing projects.

The National Childcare Scheme (NCS) went live in November 2019, and this was the first scheme to be operated on the Early Years Platform/The Hive. The Department conducts DPIAs on any new schemes being operated on the EYP/The Hive. Sytorus also conducted a PIA on the NCS in May 2017, and Trilateral conducted a DPIA on the NCS in July 2019. Subsequent to this, Castlebridge/Sonas Innovation conducted a DPIA in June 2022 on Core Funding, which went live on in September 2022.

The Privacy Impact Assessment on ECCE identifies my Department as the data controller of data processed in respect of ECCE, and Pobal as data processor. The DPIAs conducted on the other new schemes on The Hive have also identified my Department as data controller and Pobal as data processor.

Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats)
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552. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the number of registered ECCE providers that have not drawn down and or accessed core funding in 2022. [51134/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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On 15 September, I launched Together for Better, the new funding model for early learning and childcare. This new funding model supports the delivery of early learning and childcare for the public good, for quality and affordability for children, parents and families.

Together for Better brings together three major programmes, the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme, including the Access and Inclusion Model (AIM), the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) and the new Core Funding scheme.

I am delighted that to date, 91% - well over 4,000 - providers have signed up. Out of all services which have an active ECCE contract, the figure is higher - 93%.

This is a tremendous level of uptake and will make a positive impact for parents and children using these services through investment in quality and in affordability with more funding for staff and a commitment not to increase fees.

3,869 services have an active ECCE contract. Of these services, 277 have not yet come into contract for Core Funding. These services include services that only offer the ECCE programme and mixed services that also offer additional provision in alongside the ECCE programme. Services may chose to come in to Core Funding at any point throughout the programme year.

While a large majority of providers have embraced Core Funding, some have raised concerns about the impact of the changes to the funding model on small services in particular. The rationale for the change in approach is to allow for a fairer distribution of supports for graduate staff and I have been unequivocal that no service will lose out in the funding this year compared to last year. The safety net of sustainability supports is available for the small number who may experience financial difficulty.

Core Funding allows for a very substantial increase in the total cost base for the sector without requiring those costs to be passed on to parents. The vast majority of services are seeing substantial increases in funding. No service will see a decrease in funding. Core Funding will contribute to services’ sustainability and will significantly increase income for the overwhelming majority of services and provide greater funding stability. Core Funding is worth at least a 9.5 % increase to ECCE services. The value of Core Funding is greater if more hours of service or service for younger children is offered.

With Core Funding in operation for five weeks, key achievements already include:

- Fee management in place for 91% services meaning that fees cannot increase on September 2021 levels, and ensures that developments in National Childcare Scheme (NCS) are fully realised by parents.

- Agreement of Employment Regulation Orders covering staff at all grades in the sector and instituting differential pay rates for graduate staff in certain roles, putting in place a career framework for staff in the sector to support recruitment and retention.

- Improved pay for an estimated 73% of those working in the sector who will see their wages rise as a result of the Employment Regulation Orders, which would not have been achieved without Core Funding.

- A significant expansion of capacity, resulting in more hours of provision for parents and children and opportunities for staff to work more hours per week and weeks per year.

We are not seeing any evidence of a significant lack of sustainability for ECCE-only services or to suggest that services will face closure as a result of Core Funding. Services that are experiencing difficulty and who would like support are encouraged to contact their City/County Childcare Committee (CCC) to access case management supports. Services can be assisted on an individual basis through this route and it also allows for trends and themes across the country to be identified that can inform a more systematic response if necessary.

Across the country, the 30 CCCs have been working intensively to support individual providers and parents with the new scheme and continue to be available to do so.

Budget 2023 allocates €1,025m to early learning and childcare – a clear demonstration from Government of the value of the sector. Together for Better aims to transform the sector and I am committed to working with Partner Services delivering early learning and childcare for the public good.