Written answers
Tuesday, 30 September 2025
Department of Children, Disability and Equality
Childcare Services
Naoise Ó Muirí (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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782. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality for an update on the granting of an extension for a childcare service (details supplied) under the building blocks improvement scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51625/25]
Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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An application was received from Glor na nOg under the Community Extension strand of the Building Blocks Extension Grant Scheme. The service was successful in its progression to next stage, which involves the completion of a legal framework, and includes the signing of a Grant Agreement.
While the Department can appreciate the service is anxious to commence projects works, it is a condition of the scheme that all contracting requirements and pre-payment conditions must be met in advance of any works commencing.
I understand that this matter is being progressed by the Chief States Solicitors Office.
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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783. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total number of recipients of the national childcare scheme, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51727/25]
Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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The National Childcare Scheme (NCS) provides financial support to help parents reduce the cost of early learning and childcare.
Subsidies are available for children aged between 24 weeks and 15 years of age.
The minimum rate available is €2.14 per hour, which is available for up to 45 weekly hours.
The total number of recipients of the National Childcare Subsidy to date in 2025 (26/09/25) is 229,819.
For your information, the table below details the number of unique children in receipt of the NCS by year from 2020 to 2025, and further breaks those figures down into universal subsidy, income assessed subsidy, and sponsor subsidy. Please be aware the grand total may not align to the subtotals as children may move between different subsidy types during a given year.
| Subsidy rate type | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 YTD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income Assessed subsidy | 33,157 | 52,944 | 70,512 | 81,612 | 85,079 | 76,809 |
| Sponsor subsidy | 944 | 2,914 | 5,207 | 7,204 | 8,617 | 9,165 |
| Universal subsidy | 14,979 | 22,581 | 53,339 | 104,192 | 137,939 | 153,795 |
| Grand Total | 48,039 | 76,436 | 123,552 | 182,295 | 218,498 | 229,819 |
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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784. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total number of recipients of the national childcare scheme universal subsidy, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51728/25]
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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785. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total number of recipients of the national childcare income-assessed subsidy, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51729/25]
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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786. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total cost of the national childcare scheme, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51730/25]
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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787. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total cost of the national childcare scheme income-assessed subsidy, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51731/25]
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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788. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the total cost of the national childcare scheme universal subsidy, by year from 2020 to date in 2025; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51732/25]
Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 784 to 788, inclusive, together.
The National Childcare Scheme (NCS) provides financial support to help parents reduce the cost of early learning and childcare.
Subsidies are available for children aged between 24 weeks and 15 years of age. The minimum rate available is €2.14 per hour, which is available for up to 45 weekly hours.
The total cost of the National Childcare Subsidy to date in 2025 (26/09/25) is €383,385,393. To date in 2025, the universal award cost €200,288,032 and the income assessed award has cost €156,642,360.
To date in 2025 (26/09/25), there have been 229,819 unique recipients of the National Childcare Scheme. The universal subsidy has served 153,795 children, while the income assessed subsidy has served 76,809 children.
The number of children using the Scheme has grown by over 70% since 2022 due to enhancements further improving the affordability of childcare for parents. These include the extension of the upper age eligibility for the Universal award from 3 years of age to 15 years of age in August 2022. There have also been two increases to the minimum hourly subsidy rate bringing it up to the current rate of €2.14. Since September 2024, all childminders are able to register for the NCS making the scheme more accessible to more parents.
This growth was further supported by Core Funding, which aims to ensure affordability for parents through fee management conditions and ensuring that providers offer NCS and ECCE to all eligible children.
For your information, the table below details the cost of the NCS by year from 2020 to 2025, and further breaks those figures down into universal subsidy, income assessed subsidy, and sponsor subsidy.
Please be aware the grand total may not align to the subtotals as children may move between different subsidy types during a given year.
| - | € cost by subsidy type | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| - | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
| Income Assessed | 0 | 41,931,065 | 107,963,344 | 157,156,299 | 203,908,722 | 212,877,972 | 156,642,360 |
| Universal | 48,669 | 4,320,222 | 11,930,959 | 18,875,987 | 118,367,043 | 180,030,830 | 200,288,032 |
| Sponsor | 0 | 1,180,510 | 6,530,233 | 13,863,364 | 19,701,611 | 26,188,240 | 26,455,001 |
| Total | 48,669 | 47,431,798 | 126,424,536 | 189,895,650 | 341,977,377 | 419,097,041 | 383,385,393 |
Also for your information, the table below details the number of unique children in receipt of the NCS by year from 2020 to 2025, and further breaks those figures down into universal subsidy, income assessed subsidy, and sponsor subsidy.
Please be aware the grand total may not align to the subtotals as children may move between different subsidy types during a given year.
| Subsidy rate type | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 YTD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Income Assessed subsidy | 33,157 | 52,944 | 70,512 | 81,612 | 85,079 | 76,809 |
| Sponsor subsidy | 944 | 2,914 | 5,207 | 7,204 | 8,617 | 9,165 |
| Universal subsidy | 14,979 | 22,581 | 53,339 | 104,192 | 137,939 | 153,795 |
| Grand Total | 48,039 | 76,436 | 123,552 | 182,295 | 218,498 | 229,819 |
Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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789. To ask the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the estimated cost of granting every recipient the maximum rate of subsidy available under the national childcare scheme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [51733/25]
Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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There are two types of subsidies available under the NCS.
- A universal subsidy which is available to all families with children under 15 years old. This subsidy is not means tested and provides €2.14 per hour towards the cost of a registered childcare place for a maximum of 45 hours per week.
- Income Assessed Subsidies are available to families with children aged between 24 weeks and 15 years. This subsidy is means tested and will be calculated based on individual circumstances. The rate will vary depending on the level of family income, child age and educational stage, and the number of children in a family.
Officials in the Department used the ESRI SWITCH model to estimate the quantum of this proposed change and then applied it to the Department's Budget 2025 allocation for the NCS (€529.8 million).
According to the SWITCH model, the estimated cost of granting every recipient the maximum rate of subsidy (€4.35 per hour) would be €426.22 million per year. However, as the figures above are calculated using estimates, a number of caveats apply. The costing is on the basis of a static system; that is, the model assumes that the level of usage of eligible early learning and childcare does not increase or decrease but remains static. Any changes to subsidies would likely create a change in behaviour of families, for example, return to/increased labour force participation and use of formal ELC for the first time.
Any growth in the size of the sector in response to this behavioural shift would result in a corresponding increase in the cost to the government of National Childcare Scheme subsidies. It would also result in corresponding increases in the cost of some other funding schemes, e.g. Core Funding, Equal Start and AIM. In the absence of behavioural response estimates, these impacts have not yet been modelled.
To ensure the supply of places rises to meet the likely additional demand, the Department would need to ensure sufficient supply of ELC and SAC places which would require expansion of existing services, establishment of new services and workforce supply. These may require significant increases in public investment in (a) capital funding to support the creation of additional places, and (b) measures to support increases in staff wages (e.g. via Core Funding for example) to strengthen recruitment and retention of early years educators and school-age childcare practitioners.
Work is currently under way to develop an Action Plan to build an affordable, high-quality, accessible early learning and childcare system, informed by stakeholder consultation. This will set out future steps to reduce the cost of early learning and childcare further to €200 per month over the lifetime of the Government. This work will include detailed analysis of the costs of achieving these reductions, over time.
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