On 11 April, I made an announcement that this September a range of measures will be introduced by my Department to make childcare more affordable for thousands of families throughout Ireland. These include:
- A new universal subsidy will be available for all children aged between 6 months and 3 years of age (or until they are eligible for ECCE e.g. 3 years 3 months) in registered childcare. This will amount to as much as €80 a month or €1,040 per year for children in full time childcare.
- Subsidies provided under existing childcare schemes, specifically the Community Childcare Subvention (CCS) and Training and Employment Childcare (TEC) Schemes will be increased significantly, in some cases by as much as 50%.
I would note to the Deputy that as these schemes are entirely demand led, any figures can only be estimated and would be based on the number of potential beneficiaries and the level of service they will avail of. The estimated number of beneficiaries by scheme is set out in the following table for the 17/18 programme year:
Scheme
|
Expected number of beneficiaries
|
Targeted CCS bands (current)
|
25,000
|
Targeted CCS bands (additional)
|
5,000
|
TEC (current)
|
7,000
|
Universal CCS
|
33,000
|
TOTAL
|
70,000
|
The cost of these provisions will be within the envelope previously allocated to the Affordable Childcare Scheme, a figure of €150m for 2018.