Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 26 July 2022
1363. Deputy Pádraig O'Sullivan asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the amount spent on early childhood care and education scheme services per annum for each of the years 2016 to 2021 and to date in 2022; the number of providers supplying the ECCE service; and the number of ECCE-only services in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [40616/22]
View answerThe Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme is a fully funded pre-school programme available to all children within the eligible age range.
When first introduced in 2010, the ECCE programme was delivered over 38 weeks in a given programme year and children were required to be between the ages of 3 years and 2 months and 4 years and 7 months in September in the year they enrolled. Children were eligible for just one year or 38 weeks of funded pre-school under the Programme.
In 2016, the programme was expand. Under this expanded programme, children were eligible to enrol in the programme at age three and remain in programme until they transitioned primary school. Under this extension, three enrolment points were introduced – September, January and April and the average number of funded weeks under the programme increased to 61 weeks (ranging from 38 weeks to 88 weeks depending on the child’s date of birth, age to first enrol in the programme and parental choice with regard to school starting age).
The ECCE programme was expanded again in 2018. Since this time, children qualify for two years of funded pre-school and can enrol when they are 2 years and 8 months of age in September in the year they enrol and continue until they transfer to primary school.
The amount spent on ECCE programme per annum for each of the years 2016 to 2021 and to date in 2022 is outlined below. This excludes funding provided under the Access and Inclusion Model and Programme Support Payments.
|
ECCE |
2016 |
2017 |
2018 |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 (YTD) |
|
Annual Expenditure (€m) |
208 |
268 |
281 |
295 |
217 |
285 |
179 |
The number of services that have only signed an ECCE funding agreement is outlined in the table below.
While these services do not have contracts with my Department for the provision of other funded early learning and childcare schemes, such as the NCS and CCSP, they may be providing additional early learning and childcare services to parents on a fee paying basis. If they are providing additional early learning and childcare services on a fee paying basis, they would not be ECCE only services. The Department does not currently collect data from providers on private early learning and childcare arrangements.
With regard to services that have signed a contract in addition to the ECCE contract, the data is also outlined in the table below.
|
Programme call |
Services with a contract in addition to ECCE |
Services with an ECCE contract only |
|
ECCE 2016-17 |
4,225 |
2,503 |
|
ECCE 2017-18 |
4,180 |
1,107 |
|
ECCE 2018-19 |
4,176 |
1,371 |
|
ECCE 2019-20 |
4,149 |
1,407 |
|
ECCE 2020-21 |
3,996 |
1,344 |
|
ECCE 2021-22 |
3,972 |
1,351 |
