Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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My Department funds Tusla registered childcare services to provide the ECCE programme to eligible children. New Tusla registered early learning and care services are eligible to participate in ECCE.

Soon to be published research indicates that the majority of services offer a place to eligible children. In addition the majority of parents indicated they felt they had a choice of services when applying. Notwithstanding this, challenges still exist in certain parts of the country, most notably Dublin and surrounding counties. Some parents of children with additional needs such disabilities or illnesses, or families new to an area can find securing a place challenging.

On 22 February, I was pleased to announce an €18 million capital grant scheme for the Sector. The primary focus of the expansion Grant scheme is to increase capacity in the 1-3 year old (pre-ECCE) age range for full-day or part-time care. This will be achieved by funding projects that reconfigure or internally renovate existing Early Learning and Childcare services to accommodate additional children in this age category.

The Expansion Grant Scheme will provide for an immediate increase in affordable Early Learning and Childcare places in 2024. It will be the first of two significant capital investment scheme, to be delivered in 2024 and 2025.

My Department and Pobal have jointly developed a Relative Demand Model using the latest census data and information on existing provision and enrolments, as well as CSO data on commuting patterns, to generate insights into the extent to which existing levels of supply meet local demand across the country. This analysis will enable the funding to be targeted to where it is most needed.

Pobal manages the list of providers on the Early Years Platform/Hive system on behalf of my Department. This list is routinely extracted by Pobal on the first of every month and shared with my Department. Lists can also be provided to my Department by Pobal at any time on request.

If parents are having difficulty in accessing an ECCE place, they can contact their local County Childcare Committee (CCC) who will be able to advise them of all ECCE services in their locality. Parents can find the contract details for their local CCC on the website www.myccc.ie.