Barry Heneghan (Dublin Bay North, Independent)
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725. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the measures being taken to deal with the significant increase in the number of children living in poverty, as outlined in the findings of the Child Poverty Monitor Report; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [32552/25]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the Child Poverty Monitor for 2025 developed by the Children’s Rights Alliance, which analyses and reports on child poverty in Ireland focussing on thematic areas across Government including early years, education, food poverty, income inadequacy, family support and alternative care, and play and recreation.

Child poverty requires a cross government response and I am committed to supporting the broader Government action to combat child poverty. The Child Poverty and Well-being Office in the Department of the Taoiseach was established in 2023 to coordinate government actions that reduce child poverty and foster children’s well-being, focussed on improvements that have the potential to make a big difference to children living in poverty.

Child poverty is one of the priorities highlighted in Young Ireland, the National Policy Framework for Children and Young People.

My Department is taking a series of actions in this regard, as outlined in the findings of the Child Poverty Monitor report.

Early Years

The Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Programme and The National Childcare Scheme serve to address disadvantage through improving accessibility and affordability of provision, aiming to allow all families to reap the benefits of high-quality early learning and childcare, ensuring all families can avail of high quality provision. Investment in early learning and childcare is at unprecedented levels, a clear demonstration from Government of the value of the sector.

In 2025, my Department’s funding for the early learning and childcare sector has risen to €1.37 billion, a further investment of €266m, or 24% increase on last year’s funding. This includes substantial affordability, accessibility and quality building measures. It includes the further extension of Equal Start provides a set of universal and targeted measures to support access to, and full participation in, early learning and childcare for children and their families who experience disadvantage.

It also includes unprecedented levels of investment in affordability measures through the National Childcare Scheme with investment of €530m, and funding of €81m for the recently extended Access and Inclusion Model this year.

High quality early learning and childcare is important in addressing child poverty and disadvantage. In September 2024, my Department commenced the rollout of Equal Start, a major model of supports to ensure children experiencing disadvantage can access and meaningfully participate in early learning and childcare. Equal Start includes a suite of universal, child-targeted and setting-targeted supports to ensure every child, and every early learning and childcare setting will benefit from a continuum of supports that reflects a continuum of need.

Children to benefit from child-targeted supports include children living in disadvantaged areas, Traveller children, Roma children, children availing of the National Childcare Scheme through a sponsor body, children experiencing homelessness and children in the International Protection system.

Another key initiative to be rolled out in the first two years includes the design and rollout of an Additional Nutrition Programme for Early Learning and Childcare Services.

Local Area Child Poverty Action Plan pilots

Ireland’s National Action Plan under the European Child Guarantee commits to establish four pilot Child Poverty Local Area Action Child Poverty Action Plans in Children and Young People’s Services Committees (CYPSC) areas.

In 2024 and 2025, my Department provided €378,000 each year (€756,000 in total) to establish four two-year Local Area Child Poverty Action Plan pilots to explore innovative ways to address the challenges of child poverty at a local level. The pilots aim to improve outcomes for disadvantaged children, young people, and their families by first looking at particular issues in their local areas, and then using this information to improve how services work together.

Home Support

My Department has progressed the expansion of Home Visiting Services in Ireland through the support of the Children’s Fund. Up to €10 million is being allocated over the period 2024-2028 to expand home visiting services in Ireland, specifically to support the establishment of a new National Home Visiting Programme within Tusla. The aim of the programme will be to coordinate, provide direction and collect evidence and data to inform the future development of a sustainable national home visiting service. Priorities for 2025 include increasing accessibility, and integrating home visiting with other community supports with a defined set of outcomes focused on child and family wellbeing.

Foster Care

My Department has overseen a significant increase in investment in foster care supports, including a 21% increase to the rates of the foster care allowance. The rates have been increased to €400 per week for children aged under 12, and €425 per week for those over 12. In 2025, this means that foster carers will receive an additional €3,900 in allowances. A double week of the foster care allowance was also paid to foster carers, in respect of each child in their care, in late 2024.

In addition, Budget 2025 set out further investment and support towards children in foster care, including funding which will be used to provide an Initial Placement Payment at the beginning of each initial foster care placement from 2025. Provision has also been made for additional mileage support for foster carers who have significant travel responsibilities for children in their care.

Further, the current Programme for Government sets out the Government’s intention to provide further support for foster carers, including further increases to the foster care allowance and the new Initial Placement Payment, a commitment to examine pension provision for foster carers, and examine eligibility for the Back-to-School Clothing and Footwear Allowance.

Special Care

While the operation of special care and the provision of special care beds is the statutory responsibility of Tusla, my Department is actively engaging with Tusla in relation to the issues impacting on special care.

Following extensive engagements between my Department and the Department of Public Expenditure Infrastructure Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, a new grade and pay scale for Special Care has been sanctioned in an effort to increase staff numbers.

This new Tusla Special Care Worker grade offers a significantly improved salary scale, offering 19.4% higher pay at top-of-scale compared to the Social Care Worker grade. It offers 3.4% higher pay at top-of-scale than the Social Care Leader grade. Tusla commenced advertisement of this new grade in January 2025 and is in the process of onboarding the first successful candidates.

My Department also supports the ongoing work by Tusla to develop and introduce a Social Care Worker apprenticeship scheme. The scheme is currently being formulated in collaboration with relevant stakeholders including Tusla and the Higher Education Institutes and will serve as a further pipeline of recruitment into social care settings, including Special Care.

A record investment of over €1.2 billion was secured for Tusla in Budget 2025. This builds on a significant increase in Tusla’s allocation in 2024.

An additional €1 million has been made available in Budget 2025 to support Tusla to address staffing issues in special care. Furthermore, an additional €1.55 million was also made available for the provision of supplementary step-down placements and the capital funding to purchase, renovate and equip those units.

Unaccompanied Minors

Tusla’s Separated Children Seeking International Protection Service offers an urgent response to the presenting needs of Unaccompanied Minors who arrive in the jurisdiction unaccompanied by parents or caregivers (both Ukrainian and International protection).

There has been a 500% increase in the arrival of Unaccompanied Minors and being accommodated by Tusla since 2022.

The Government is fully committed to supporting Tusla’s work in this area with additional funding provided in 2025 to support Tusla in its work in relation to increased demands for supports and accommodation for Unaccompanied Minors and for Tusla’s Separated Children Seeking International Protection Service.

Tusla has developed a new Model of Care for the Separated Children Seeking International Protection Service, the first Model of Care for the service.

Play, Participation and Recreation

My Department continues to promote and develop play and recreation by commissioning research into public provision and the gaps that exist for some cohorts of children and young people, and through dedicated funding schemes to support and promote play and recreation. These include the annual National Play Day Fund, which Local Authorities can access to promote play activities at a specific time each year (this year between July 5th and July 13th). The long running Capital Grant Scheme for Play and Recreation this year provided €500k to successful Local Authorities to refurbish existing or develop new facilities which are safe and accessible to all children, available for use when children are free to use them and reflect consultation with local children.

Most recently, I announced Dormant Accounts funding in 2025 to develop a competitive funding scheme through which Local Authorities can target the unmet play needs of teenagers, who are recognised as an underserved cohort in relation to public facilities. Consultation with the local Comhairle na nÓg is a requirement of this funding scheme. A total of seven awards were made under this scheme.