Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 8 September 2022
1279. Deputy Richard Bruton asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if the core funding scheme applies only to hours not covered by ECCE; and if it applies to hours delivered for children who have completed ECCE. [44209/22]
View answerCore Funding is a payment to partner services designed to support quality, sustainability, and enhanced public management, with associated conditions in relation to fee control and cost transparency, incorporating funding for planning and administration and to support the employment of graduate staff. Core Funding is calculated on the basis of all hours in which the service is open and available to children, including hours offered under the ECCE programme and those offered in addition to ECCE.
For the programme year 2022/2023, services that deliver the ECCE programme will receive standard capitation in respect of registered children and will have the option to also avail of Core Funding. Core Funding provides funding based on a service's capacity (opening hours, number of places and age group of children), and graduate premiums for lead educators and managers. While Core Funding will operate in addition to and alongside ECCE (standard capitation), AIM, CCSP and NCS, it replaces ECCE higher capitation and incorporates funding previously allocated to the discretionary Programme Support Payments (PSP) from September 2022.
Under Core Funding, the vast majority of services will see an increase in funding, and a very percentage of services will see no change. No service will see a decrease in funding if their combined annual value of Core Funding and Interim Funding is less than the combined value of the difference between ECCE standard capitation and higher capitation plus PSP for the 2021/22 programme year, as outlined in the Core Funding Partner Service Funding Agreement.
For any service that does experience financial difficulties, a Sustainability Fund will be in place. This new strand of the Sustainability Fund, linked to Core Funding, will be designed to provide an extra safety net for providers. This will be open to both private and community providers.
Core Funding is open to all eligible providers subject to their agreement to the Funding Agreement. Becoming a Core Funding Partner Service is, of course, optional but I look forward to working with the very high proportion of providers who choose to become Partner Services.
