Shónagh Ní Raghallaigh (Kildare South, Sinn Fein)
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530. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality her views on the opposite trends in the direction of preschool (decreasing) and school age (increasing) services over the past number of years; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49783/25]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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Improving access to quality and affordable Early Learning and Care and School Age Childcare is a key priority of Government.

Early learning and childcare capacity is increasing. Data from the Annual Early Years Sector Profile 2023/24 shows that the estimated number of enrolments increased by approximately 19% from the 2021/22 programme year. Core Funding application data shows that between Year 1 and Year 3 of the scheme, annual place hours increased by over 15%. The Tusla register of services demonstrates a net increase in the numbers of registered early learning and childcare services in 2024.

This is particularly the case with school age childcare services with 261 new school age childcare services having opened in 2024. Estimated enrolments in school-age childcare, based on Sector Profile data, have grown by 56% over the last two years.

The National Childcare Scheme (NCS) provides financial supports to parents to help reduce the cost of early learning and childcare. The Scheme has undergone a number of enhancements in recent years to further improve affordability for parents. These include the extension of the Universal subsidy to all children under 15 and two increases to the minimum hourly subsidy, which is now worth €2.14 per hour. These enhancements have helped to result in a positive growth in the number of families benefitting from NCS subsidies and the expansion of the sector.

Last year there was a net increase of 1 early learning and care service. During 2024, 96 early learning and care services opened and 95 closed. Previous years saw declines in the number of early learning and care services, though the rate of decline fell over this period. The net decline went from 106 in 2020, to 76 in 2021, 58 in 2022, and 29 in 2023.

I should stress, though, that a decrease in the number of services does not necessarily imply a decrease in the number of places for children, as services vary in size.

In particular the expansion in Core Funding annual place hours reflects expansion of service capacity, which means that an increasing number of children have access to Early Learning and Childcare, which I welcome.

However, it appears that demand for early learning and childcare remains higher than available supply in certain parts of the country, particularly for younger children.

Demand for early learning and childcare beyond sessional pre-school provision is highly elastic and shaped very substantially by families' individual composition, circumstances, and preferences; employment patterns and income; and the price and availability of services.

This Department continues to support the ongoing development and resourcing of Core Funding which has given rise to a significant expansion of places since the scheme was first introduced. Core Funding, which is in its fourth programme year, funds services based on the number of places available.

This provides stability to services, and reduces the risk associated with opening a new service or expanding an already existing service. For the previous programme year, the allocation for Core Funding allowed for a 6% increase in capacity. Additional funding was secured in Budget 2025 to facilitate a further 3.5% increase from September 2025.

In 2025, €25m in voted expenditure was made available for the Building Blocks Extension Grant Scheme. This allows existing Core Funding Partner Services to extend their existing premises or, in the case of community services, to construct or purchase new premises. Fifty applications were approved to progress to the next stage of the Building Blocks Extension Grant Scheme, which when completed they will deliver up to 1,500 additional full time childcare places for 1–3-year-olds.

The Programme for Government commits for the first time to provide capital investment to build or purchase state-owned early learning and childcare facilities, to create additional capacity in areas where unmet need exists. State ownership of facilities is a very substantial and significant development and offers the potential for much greater scope to influence the nature and volume of provision available and to ensure better alignment with estimated demand. This work will be supported through capital investment under the revised National Development Plan.

The approach more widely to ensuring appropriate levels of early learning and childcare supply is being considered by my Department and will be further articulated in the context of the Action Plan to build an affordable, high-quality, accessible early childhood education and care system that Government has committed to publishing.