Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 9 June 2020
603. Deputy Anne Rabbitte asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the expenditure of her Department on the overhead payment to childcare providers following the closure of crèches due to Covid-19 in tabular form. [9870/20]
View answerThe COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in an unprecedented situation that has required a series of emergency responses from the Government.
I launched the Temporary Wage Subsidy Childcare Scheme (TWSCS) on 15 April. The TWSCS provides substantial funding towards staff wages, and provides for a portion of services’ non-deferrable overhead costs.
As of the 5th June 2020 TWSCS subsidies had been calculated in respect of 1,607 organisations, and totalled €23.3m. Of this, €10.4m related to the overhead contribution.
I note that 3,884 providers have signed a TWSCS funding agreement to-date. As of 5th June 2020 a total of €49.3m has been disbursed under all elements of this scheme. This overall expenditure figure includes TWSCS pre-payments that were made to providers for an initial period following the launch of the scheme, until the information necessary to process overhead and employee-based payments had been collected. It is not possible to extrapolate the amount of these pre-payments that pertained specifically to the overhead contribution.
