Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 25 July 2023
1053. Deputy Catherine Connolly asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the details of any analysis carried out or commissioned by his Department into the operation of the core funding scheme to date; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36677/23]
View answerCore Funding is the new funding scheme worth €259 million in full year costs for Year 1 of the programme (September 2022-August 2023).
The Scheme has been designed to meet the combined objectives of:
• Improved affordability for parents by ensuring that fees do not increase;
• Improved quality through better pay and conditions for the workforce by supporting agreement on an Employment Regulation Order through the Joint Labour Committee;
• Supporting the employment of graduate staff; and
• Improved sustainability and stability for services.
In operation since September 2022, there already is very significant evidence of positive impact it has had on the sector.
Over 95% of services joined Core Funding in Year 1. This uptake rate means that a fee freeze is also in place for over 95% services, freezing fees at September 2021 levels. This improves affordability and ensures that developments in the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) are fully realised by parents.
Core Funding has contributed to sustainability by significantly increasing income for the overwhelming majority of services and providing greater funding stability. 99% of services participating in Core Funding increased funding, and 1% of services (61) have received top-up payments under the Funding Guarantee.
Core Funding supported the agreement of Employment Regulation Orders (ERO) covering staff at all grades in the sector and instituting differential pay rates for graduate staff in certain roles, putting in place a career framework for staff in the sector to support recruitment and retention. This has resulted in improved pay for more than 70% of those working in the sector.
Core Funding has supported a significant expansion of capacity, resulting in more hours of provision for parents and children and opportunities for staff to work more hours per week and weeks per year. Initial analysis shows the increased capacity is the type of capacity that is in highest demand relative to supply (i.e. more baby and toddler places as well as school-age places).
Moreover, the number of services offering the NCS, a condition of Core Funding, has increased by 15%.
In 2022, I introduced a new strand of Sustainability Funding to ensure that services participating in Core Funding, whether community or private, would remain sustainable with the introduction of the new funding model. Trends in services entering case management and the numbers of services seeking Sustainability Funding has been low. Just nine services were considered for this new Strand of funding but were deemed ineligible by the relevant CCC and/or Pobal.
Moreover, trends concerning service registrations are also closely monitored. Latest data from Tusla on service registrations shows that the number of services that closed so far in 2023 are lower than previous years (see tables below).
|
ELC Closures |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
|
January - June |
92 |
51 |
61 |
58 |
42 |
|
Total |
196 |
197 |
141 |
141 |
N/A |
|
ELC New Registrations |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
|
January - June |
16 |
17 |
11 |
21 |
18 |
|
Total |
93 |
91 |
65 |
83 |
N/A |
From September 2023, I have grown the Core Funding budget by 11% to reach €287 million for Year 2 of the scheme, providing a sustainable platform for investment with increases for all services.
The allocation of this additional funding was informed by the emerging data from Year 1 of operation as well as initial insights from an independent financial review of sessional services.
Given the issues raised by some small, sessional services, and in order to provide additional timely and robust data in preparation for developments to Core Funding in Year 2, my Department appointed Frontier Economics to undertake this review at the beginning of this year.
This review involved sessional services volunteering to participate in the research project that aimed to gather evidence on financial viability to underpin policy development and possible targeted measures through the new funding model. The review began in Q1 2023 and while the final report is outstanding, initial insights received by my Department is inconclusive and sector-wide findings are not possible given the small number of services who engaged with the review.
Nonetheless, I have announced targeted measures for Core Funding Year 2, to support and fund smaller and sessional services. These include a flat rate allocation of €4,075 for all sessional-only services, which will benefit approximately 1,700 services delivering ECCE, and a minimum base rate allocation of €8,150, which will benefit small, part time and school-age services.
It is anticipated that the final report of the review will be provided to my Department in the coming weeks and will be published in Q3 of 2023.
Together for Better begins a journey that I am confident will see exceptional standards of early learning and childcare achieved, delivering Government commitments in Partnership for the Public Good, expanding the sector and growing capacity through public management and investment, and ensuring positive outcomes for children, their families, and society overall.
