Maeve O'Connell (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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1942. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to provide a list of childcare providers currently operating in Dublin Rathdown, along with the number of such providers currently in receipt of core funding; the number of such providers that have requested an increase in core funding; the number of such providers that have left the core funding model since its implementation; the number of such providers that have closed down in the past five years; the number of such providers that have begun operation within the past two years, in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [20863/25]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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Tusla, the independent statutory regulator for early years services, including pre-school, childminding and school-age services, is responsible for maintaining the register of services under the Child Care Act 1991. The number of early years services registered with Tusla across the whole of Co. Dublin (including Dun Laoghaire Rathdown, Dublin City, Dublin South and Fingal) as at end of March 2025 is as follows:

As this data is recorded on a county-by-county basis, it is not possible to aggregate this data by smaller geographical areas and so Tusla is unable to provide the breakdown requested in the question (data for Dublin Rathdown only).

The figures in the table for School Age Services refer to the total count of service with the category School Age, including both standalone services and those combined with pre-school services.

Further data provided from Tusla on service registrations in Dublin County are detailed in the following table, which shows the number of pre-school and school age services that opened from January 2020 to end of March 2025 as well as the number of services that ceased operation in Dublin County over the same time-period.

It must be noted, however, that where a facility that was providing both pre-school and school-age services closes fully, the reported cessations will be counted twice in the figures in the table (once in the pre-school row and once in the school-age row), as pre-school services and school-age services are regulated separately and are maintained on separate registers as separate services. It must also be noted that the Childminding Services Regulations only became operative in September 2024.

The table below shows the number of services in all of County Dublin currently contracted to Core Funding, and the number of such providers that applied for increases through the Fee Increase Assessment process. Unlike in the data above on service openings and closures, in the table below a service that caters for both pre-school children and school-age children is only counted once.

Of those services:

60 joined the first and/or second year of Core Funding, and did not join the current third year of the scheme,

3 withdrew from the current programme year, and

1 had their contract for the current programme year declined for a breach of rules.