Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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1550.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he will indicate the eligibility criteria for a child to participate in the free early childhood care and education scheme; and the hourly or weekly rate payable to providers that deliver service under the scheme.[35818/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme is available to all children within the eligible age range of 2 years and 8 months to 5 years and 6 months. A child must have reached 2 years and 8 months of age on or prior to 31 August of the relevant programme year to be eligible.

The minimum eligibility age of 2 years and 8 months was chosen based on national experience and a review of international practice. It also had regard to the regulatory environment for early years’ education and care in this country and issues such as child development readiness and adult-child ratios.

The standard weekly ECCE capitation is €69.00 and is paid pro rata to the number of days a child is registered, subject to attendance requirements, for the 2024/2025 ECCE programme year. ECCE must be available free of charge to parents/guardians for 3 hours a day, 5 days per week for 182 days in return for this capitation.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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1551.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if the Access and Inclusion Mode (AIM) has been extended beyond ECCE years; the range of services which are made available within ECCE under AIM; the range of services that are now on offer for other childcare settings; and how the number of children served under each element of the programme has grown as a result of the change.[35819/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The goal of the Access and Inclusion Model (AIM) is to empower pre-school providers to deliver an inclusive pre-school experience, ensuring that every eligible child can meaningfully participate in early learning and childcare.

AIM encompasses a range of both universal and targeted supports for early learning and care settings. Universal supports are designed to create a more inclusive culture in settings, through training courses and qualifications for staff. Where universal supports are not enough to meet the needs of an individual child, targeted supports are available to ensure that the child can meaningfully participate in the ECCE programme.

Universal supports:

Level 1, which aims to embed an inclusive culture in pre-school early learning and care settings, includes the national inclusion policy and guidelines, the funding of the Leadership for Inclusion (LINC) training programme, the establishment of Inclusion Co-Ordinator (INCO) roles in early learning and care settings, and a capitation payment of €2 per registered ECCE child for settings with qualified Inclusion Co-ordinators.

Level 2 provides information about AIM to parents and providers through the AIM.gov.ie website and County/City Childcare Committees (CCC).

Level 3 recognises the requirement to continue to develop a qualified workforce that can confidently meet the needs of all children participating in the ECCE Programme. Supports include funding of training courses such as Hanen, Lámh and Sensory Processing E-Learning (SPEL).

Targeted supports:

Level 4 addresses the need of Early Years Educators to have timely access to advice and support from experts in early learning and care (and disability in particular) to assist them meet each child’s needs.

Level 5 recognises that some children require specialised equipment, appliances, assistive technology and/or that some settings may require minor structural alterations to ensure children with a disability can participate in the ECCE programme. Supports include grants for equipment and some minor capital building works.

Level 6 provides access to therapeutic supports where they are critical to enable a child to be enrolled, and fully participate, in the ECCE programme.

Level 7: Additional assistance in the pre-school room involves additional capitation for settings where an application process has demonstrated that supports at Level 1-6 have not, or will not, by themselves, meet the child’s needs. Funding can be used by the provider to buy in additional support, or to reduce the staff / child ratio, supporting the Lead Educator to ensure the child’s optimal participation.

AIM has now expanded beyond time spent in the Early Childhood Care and Education Programme (ECCE) programme for ECCE aged children. Children can now access these supports for up to an additional 3 hours per day during the ECCE term and up to 6 hours per day outside of the ECCE term (in holiday periods). All of the provision detailed above is available both in ECCE hours and outside of those hours.

The application process for these additional hours was made available on the Early Years Hive from Monday, 2 September.

Given that the application process for these supports has just opened, the change in the number of children is not available.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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1552.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he has received an assessment of the administrative burden for providers of childcare services in complying with eligibility and record keeping under Core Funding and national childcare scheme; the simplification proposals which he has already implemented and those up for further consideration; and if he will make a statement on the matter.[35820/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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On 19 September 2023, plans to develop an Action Plan for Administrative and Regulatory Simplification for the Early Learning and Childcare Sector were announced, supported by a Working Group comprising representatives from the Department, Pobal and the City / County Childcare Committees.

This initiative is being informed by an Advisory Group comprising providers, educator/practitioner and parent representatives, which was convened in December 2023

Indecon economic consultants have carried out a review of the end to end processes linked to publicly funded early learning and childcare schemes/programmes and a report will be produced of the findings of this review and the feedback received from over 400 parents, providers, representative bodies and other key sectoral stakeholders at series of regional consultation events held over May and June 2024.

The completed review is anticipated to be published in Q4 and will offer an insight into administrative and regulatory requirements for the sector and the balance of same while continuing to ensure best governance and quality is delivered.

Work on developing the Action Plan which will outline short-term, medium-term, and long term administrative and regulatory simplification measures, is at an advanced stage and will be finalised and published by the end of Q4 2024

The Department has been working with Pobal to enhance the provider and parent online administrative portals and to put in place a suite of provider and parent supports in order to reduce administrative demands, where appropriate over a number of years. Engagement with providers has underpinned this work. A Sub-Group of the Early Learning and Childcare Stakeholder Forum was convened in November 2022 to identify ways to reduce provider administration for the January 2023 NCS rate increase. The increase required providers to issue tens of thousands of new parental agreements with the new co-payment rates.

In response, Pobal deployed a semi-automated combined parental agreement/fee statement in December 2022, released the uplift portal details in early December and gave a 3-month window to complete the contracts. A combined parental agreement was also introduced for the 2023/24 programme year obviating the need to update agreements on subsequent co-payment changes. New functionality was delivered for Core Funding’s application process for the 2023/24 programme year, which significantly reduced the administration associated with re-applying for the scheme this year. In additional a universal fees list was introduced in 2023.

In programme readiness this year Pobal and my Department have a number of developments which will enable information on the service profile to be cloned and used for other ELC purposes by providers. While there will be some benefit to services in the short term the true benefit of this initiative will only be known in renewal process for 2025 but it is a measure intended to reduce duplication of inputs which was a consistent point raised at the consultations.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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1553.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth when childminders will be included within the national childcare scheme; the level of support per hour that will be provided; the number who have registered to date; and the target for registration over the coming months.[35822/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The National Action Plan for Childminding 2021-2028 commits to extending regulation and supports to all paid, non-relative childminders who work in their own homes. The National Action Plan sets out a phased approach to regulation with a preparatory phase followed by an extended transition period, to allow childminders lead-in time for any requirements. This supportive, phased process aims to facilitate the largest possible number of childminders to enter the regulated sector, the sphere of quality assurance, and access to Government subsidies, while recognising the time and supports required for this reform.

The main route through which parents are subsidised for their early learning and childcare costs is the National Childcare Scheme. The Childcare Support Act 2018, which provides a statutory basis for the National Childcare Scheme, specifies that only Tusla-registered providers are eligible to participate in the Scheme. The limitation of public funding schemes to Tusla-registered childcare providers helps to ensure that public funding is provided where there is assurance of the quality of provision.

The level of subsidy available through the National Childcare Scheme will be the same for parents who use Tusla-registered childminders as it is for those using centre-based services.

At the end of July 2024 (i.e. prior to the commencement of the new Regulations), the number of Tusla-registered childminders was 70.

Once commenced, the Child Care (Amendment) Act 2024 will remove the exemption of childminders from the application of Part VIIA of the Child Care Act, to facilitate the extension of regulation to all paid, non-relative childminders. The Act provides for a transition period of three years before registration becomes mandatory. During the transition period, childminders will be able to register with Tusla under new childminder-specific regulations and will then be able to take part in the National Childcare Scheme. Childminders will not be required to register during the transitional period.

The new, childminding-specific regulations, which will be finalised and published shortly, will be proportionate and appropriate to the home and family setting in which childminders work.

As there will be a 3-year transitional period for childminders to register, it is expected that numbers registering with Tusla will rise over the course of the 3-year period. Funding has been provided to the City/County Childcare Committees for Childminding Development Officers to work at local level, engaging with childminders and supporting them through registration, including through delivery of a pre-registration training programme. Childminding Development Officers will also support childminders with their application to register for the National Childcare Scheme.

Under the Regulations it may take up to 3 months for Tusla to complete the registration process for a childminder following receipt of a fully completed application, though in practice it is not expected to take that long. Once a childminder is registered with Tusla, they may apply to join the National Childcare Scheme. Payments under the National Childcare Scheme can only be paid from the date of registration with National Childcare Scheme, not from the date of application or registration with Tusla.

I intend to commence the new Childminding Regulations at the end of September, along with the relevant sections of the Child Care (Amendment) Act 2024. Tusla will also open their registration portal for childminders at that time.

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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1554.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth for a schedule of fees, broken down by crèche, for all childcare providers that avail of the core funding scheme for 2021; where parents can access such information for their individual provider for the purposes of comparing with the fees charged; and if he will make a statement on the matter.[35903/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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Fees list for the 2023/2024 and 2024/2025 programme years are available to view by parents on the NCS website under the Childcare Search function (www.ncs.gov.ie/en/childcare-search/). Historical fees lists for each service will be added to this website in the coming weeks to give parents the ability to check previous years fees where there is a concern.

In the meantime, parents can contact the Parent Support Centre by phone by completing a contact form on the website to ask about year-on-year comparison of fees lists for their individual early learning and childcare service. Parents can also contact their local City/County Childcare Committee (CCC) for information and support regarding fees. The CCC’ have access to all fees lists for their region.

While we can provide a schedule of current and historical fees for all services registered to deliver our schemes, this will be an unwieldy spreadsheet due to the large body of information requested and may not be useful to the Deputy.

Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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1555.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he is aware of an issue (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter.[35907/24]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The Magic Roundabout, registered as Beautiful Minds Crèche & Montessori Ltd. received €177,579.70 in year 1 of Core Funding and, as of June 2024, the service had a contract value of €188,820.82 for year 2 of the scheme.

Services coming into contract for year 3 of the scheme will benefit from further increases in Core Funding owing to the 15% increase in the total allocation for the scheme, which now stands at €331 million. Specifically:

• The Base Rates for all age groups are increasing with larger increases in funding for places offered to children under the age of three. In short, all providers currently signed up to Core Funding will receive a higher payment going forward to support their day-to-day costs.
• The flat rate for services registered on the Tusla Early Years Register as sessional-only (a pre-school service offering a programme for a total of not more than 3.5 hours per session) is increasing from €4,075 to €5,000. This will strengthen supports to sessional-only services, who typically operate for shorter hours per week and fewer weeks per year.
• The minimum Base Rate allocation is increasing from €8,150 to €14,000. This is the minimum amount of funding a centre-based service (not childminders) will receive through their Base Rate, and ensures a minimum guaranteed income for services. This increase supports for smaller services and services operating in rural areas, who may be prone to fluctuations in demand.
• The maximum Base Rate allocation is decreasing from €600,000 to €500,000. Services will not receive funding through the Base Rate beyond this maximum value. Any service receiving more than this maximum value will see their Base Rate funding reduce to this level.

Up to now, services availing of Core Funding have not been allowed to raise their fees above what was charged to parents on 30 September 2021 (or at the point of first signing up for Core Funding if the service did not exist on 30 September 2021).

The fee freeze will remain in place for the majority of these services for year 3 of Core Funding, though there are two new developments:

• Services whose fees have been frozen at a level that may not be sufficient to sustain their business even with increased funding available through Core Funding, will have the opportunity to apply for a Fee Increase Assessment. Only services currently charging low fees (fees below the average in their county) will be eligible to apply.
• A cap on fees is being introduced for services joining Core Funding for the first time in the third year. A fee cap will apply to all services in Core Funding from September 2025.

Services have been strongly encouraged to avail of these supports as an alternative to withdrawing from Core Funding and removing the benefit of Core Funding to children and their families.

While it is my ambition to have as high take-up as possible, a small proportion of early learning and childcare services – approximately 5% overall - chose not to join Core Funding in Year 1 and Year 2. Applications for Year 3 of Core Funding are on par with the same period last year and remain open to all eligible services to apply, including the service in question.

Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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1556.To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth when a facility (details supplied) will be fully operational; and if he will make a statement on the matter.[35930/24]

Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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As this question relates to service matters, I have asked the Health Service Executive (HSE) to respond to the Deputy directly, as soon as possible.