Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 23 November 2023
280. Deputy Robert Troy asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to increase the early childhood care and education, ECCE, payment and core funding for child care providers (details supplied). [51700/23]
View answerCore Funding incorporates funding for providers for administrative requirements, and in September 2024, an additional €3.21m is being made available to support services with their administrative requirements in light of the increasing uptake of the NCS. In addition, the staffing allocation in Core Funding takes account of both contact time and non-contact time (based on previous survey data).
The Department acknowledges the increase in administration for providers with the introduction of new schemes such as the NCS and Core Funding. In addition to providing €32.13 million for administration under Core Funding in year two, and €35.34m for the third year of the scheme, a number of steps are being taken to reduce the administrative workload.
This year a Universal Fee Table has been introduced, which will enable services to upload one single fee table that covers all schemes. The Parent Statement has also been refined so that one agreement now covers all schemes and this only has to be signed once between the provider and parent irrespective of fee changes.
In addition, a number of targeted supports are being considered by the Department to enable Core Funding Partner Services to comply with the financial reporting requirement.
An Action Plan for Administrative and Regulatory Simplification is under development, informed by an independent review of end to end processes linked to publicly funded schemes and programmes. This review is being prioritised over the coming months. As part of the process the Department will undertake a series of regional consultation events.
Informed by this review, An Action Plan which will outline short-term, medium-term, and long term administrative and regulatory simplification measures will be produced, while continuing to ensure best governance and quality is delivered.
To assist with this important process, an Advisory Group, comprising provider and parent representatives, which will offer an overarching point of consultation and advice has been formed. The first meeting of the Advisory Group is scheduled to take place on December 1st. A working group comprising DCEDIY, Pobal and CCC staff will also be convened to run in parallel.
Regarding ECCE capitation, I would note that I have appointed Stranmillis University College, Belfast to undertake an independent review of the ECCE programme. The review will assess whether the ECCE Programme is meeting its core objectives and will identify any changes or improvements that can be made to the Programme, based on international evidence and experience to date. The final report is expected to be completed by the end of 2023. I will then consider the review fully and consider any policy changes that may need to be made to the programme.
