Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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518. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if his attention has been drawn to the practice of requesting non-refundable monetary deposits in exchange for places in crèche services; if his Department has put in place any conditions to prevent this practice from occurring; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4036/23]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Supporting parents in bringing down the cost of Early Learning & Care and School-Aged Childcare is a core ambition of the Government and of mine as Minister. To that end, the Deputy will be aware that, owing to the significant investment made available by the Government for providers over two successive Budgets, from 2 January of this year the cost of childcare has fallen for thousands of parents participating in the National Childcare Scheme. It is my aim to reduce this cost further. 

With regard to the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme and the Community Childcare Subvention Plus (CCSP) Saver programme, my Department allows for the collection of deposits by early learning and care providers however these deposits are subject to certain conditions.

For ECCE, a provider may only charge a refundable booking deposit to hold an ECCE place for a child. The maximum deposit a provider may charge is equivalent to four weeks ECCE payment, however, the deposit must be returned to the parent/guardian once the child’s ECCE registration is approved.

For CCSP, the maximum deposit a provider may charge is equivalent to two weeks’ payment. The full amount of the CCSP subvention held on deposit must be refunded to the parent/guardian once the child’s registration is approved. 

It is also a condition of the new Core Funding scheme that deposits to secure early learning and care places must be refundable, which extends the requirement to do so beyond services participating in ECCE and CCSP. The Funding Agreement clause states: The Partner Service agrees that they will not charge any non-refundable deposits to parents/guardians in the respect of their ELC/SAC service where the parent/guardian takes up the service for which the deposit was paid.

Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent)
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519. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he will provide an update on the case of a person (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4038/23]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Officials in my Department have contacted the Scheme Administrator, Pobal, in relation to the case raised on behalf of your constituent. Pobal have reviewed the case and advised that the applicant has since submitted a new application, which has been completed. The relevant awards have since been issued by Pobal, which are valid from Monday 30 January.

The application referred to here was submitted in October 2022. Before going in to further detail, it should be noted that this initial application was a non-fast track, offline application. The offline application process may take considerably longer than online, and it is dependent on all required information being correctly submitted.  

In detail:

- The application was first submitted on 24 October 2022. It was then referred back by the Scheme Administrator twice on 25 October, and 21 November, as information was either missing or incorrect.

- The applicant contacted the Parent Support Centre on 24 November seeking clarification in relation to the application. Pobal provided support on this occasion and further contacted the applicant on 12 December and 21 December regarding information required as part of the application.

- Pobal attempted to lodge a second call with the applicant on 21 December, however this call went unanswered.

- Between 22 December and 6 January, Pobal attempted to make contact with the applicant a further three times. However, contact was unsuccessful.

- On 23 January, Pobal explained to the contact that their application had been cancelled due to inactivity and that a new application would need to be made.

- A courtesy call was placed by Pobal on 25 January, which the applicant responded to. The applicant was then supported through the application process and, as mentioned, has since successfully completed an application and received a subsidy.