Priority Questions

Early Childhood Care and Education Funding

Anne Rabbitte

Ceist:

16. Deputy Anne Rabbitte asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs when her Department will arrange for payments to be issued to community early years child care providers in recognition of the impact on those providers of the full implementation of the Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services) Regulations 2016 relating to the minimum FETAC level 5 qualification for staff in respect of the €1 million fund she has announced; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that certain community early years providers require these funds in order to maintain their services; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [15424/17]

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

I wish to ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs when her Department will arrange for payments to be issued to community early years child care providers in recognition of the impact on those providers of the full implementation of the Child Care Act 1991 (Early Years Services) Regulations 2016 relating to the minimum FETAC level 5 qualification for staff in respect of the €1 million fund she has announced; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that certain community early years providers require these funds to maintain their services; and if she will make a statement on the matter.

Minister for Children and Youth Affairs (Deputy Katherine Zappone)

I thank the Deputy for her question. The child care regulations introduced for newly-registering preschool services on 30 June 2016, and for existing services on 31 December 2016, require all staff working directly with children to have at least a major award at level 5 on the national qualifications framework in early childhood care and education or a qualification deemed by the Minister to be equivalent. As the Deputy will be aware, this regulation has been extensively welcomed as being in the best interests of children.

I recognise, however, the impact increased regulation is having on community settings – from my own experience, from a number of meetings I have had with providers and representative groups and from the early years forum I established to ensure that providers’ voices are heard. In 2017, I provided for €1 million of additional funding to be made available to child care providers who have been facilitating the training of community employment participants to ensure that regulatory changes do not impact on service delivery or the availability of child care places. Officials have been working with Pobal and Childcare Committees Ireland to get funding out to services affected by the change in respect of community employment scheme participants and I understand that contracts to enable payment have now issued to services. Funds will be disbursed without delay once these contracts are signed. Funding will be provided in two phases, the first of which is to cover advertising and recruitment costs, while the second will follow more detailed financial analysis of services in the coming weeks.

In addition, funding of €14.5 million will be made available for the first time in 2017 for non-contact time to recognise the increasing volume of work done outside of direct contact hours with children.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House

The sector has taken the initiative of commissioning and completing research highlighting the challenges that they face and I am acutely aware that we need to get the funding model right for these services. This is a complex issue and I hope that providers will appreciate that we have had to move to tackle the most urgent issues first, designing a new model of eligibility for families - the affordable childcare scheme, tackling the community employment scheme issue, and providing funding for non-contact time for the first time. I remain committed to addressing other sustainability and quality issues, particularly in disadvantaged areas. The last two budgets delivered a 35% increase each year in funding for child care. However, it is recognised that there is a need to continue to invest and a strong case will be put forward for more resources in 2018 and beyond.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

I thank the Minister for her response. I tabled this question because a number of community child care providers have contacted me. As the Minister will be aware, a number of meetings regarding this issue have been held, particularly in the south of the country. I asked the Minister for Social Protection a few weeks ago to indicate the number of workers participating on community employment schemes in a child care setting and he replied that at the end of December 2016, the number was 1,816 participants. That did not include Tús workers. While they would not be engaged in trying to get a FETAC level 5 qualification, the participants on that scheme were possibly taken in under a ratio. A total of 800 participants were sponsored by child care providers. The number of such participants in the rural social scheme, RSS, is 41. As the Minister will be aware from her contact with child care providers, they have relied on those numbers. The child care providers have not received funds. If the €1 million fund was divvied out among the more than 1,800 participants, it would not sustain a month's wages for them. Therefore, there is a crisis in the sector.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

As the Deputy indicated, I am aware of the issues she outlined. I have also spoken to and have had a meeting with the Minister for Social Protection on this matter. I have asked my officials to focus on the most acute challenges facing services and the impact of the removal of unqualified community employment workers from ratios is one of those most acute challenges. I am aware of these challenges from my meetings, from the research that has been done by child care providers that has been presented to me, as well as from the work done by Childcare Committees Ireland. I have described that two phases of sustainability responses will be put in place. The first is the initial grant and the second is where we are getting more people to assist us in going into those services whose sustainability is challenged to analyse their finances and see what we can further do for them in regard to the €1 million fund.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

I welcome that the Minister finished her response by saying that she will look into the community sector to assist those services challenged with respect to their viability and sustainability. In one crèche in Clare that has a staff of ten, it relies on community employment workers for four positions. I would love to know if the Minister's Department has done an analysis on that. How many such workers were close to qualifying in terms of their major award? If they had started in 2013 or 2014, were some of them almost qualified or could a grace period have been provided to allow them finish their qualification, with support from the community child care sector? When one is doing something like this in January, one is looking at recruitment, staffing and advertising. It is a very difficult time with providers taking in children under the next phase of the early childhood care and education, ECCE, scheme. I welcome what the Minister has said but the community sector is really under pressure at present.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I completely with the Deputy in that regard. She will appreciate that my Department gave a substantial lead-in period to allow for most of the members within the child care and early education sector to prepare for and comply with the regulations. I fully understand it was not possible for that to be the case, particularly with regard to some of the people who are providing in the community services context. I am also aware that even if they had, and I have met with some services who have described some of the difficulties to me, they still would be under pressure in terms of sustainability. One of the reasons for that, particularly in those contexts, is that they are reaching out to do effectively more beyond what child care providers are doing in other contexts, and one of the other things we are looking at is how to ensure there is enough support going into those services, perhaps from other programmes of funding, in addition to the child care provision that I am providing.

Mother and Baby Homes Inquiries

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

Ceist:

17. Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if she has considered pursuing an injunction on sites in which mother and baby homes and county homes are located; the action she will take to ensure potential sites of interest remain untampered with; the status of the site at Tuam; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [15276/17]

Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

Baineann an cheist seo leis na tithe máithreacha agus leanaí. As the Minister knows, there has been a great deal of discussion regarding recent revelations in Tuam. However, a great deal of the discussion subsequently has related not only to Tuam but to many other locations and the possibility that there may be unmarked graves. My question relates to the steps the Government intends to take to ensure that any of those possible unmarked graves are not interfered with.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

It is important to appreciate that these institutions ceased operating many decades ago. The reality is that many of the buildings and sites which accommodated mother and baby homes and county homes have evolved significantly in the intervening years. These locations are now being used for a wide array of different activities and purposes, ranging from housing estates to private health care facilities and hotels. In some cases nothing remains of the former institutions and the locations are not in public ownership. In these circumstances, we would have to be clear about the exact purpose of seeking any injunction.

With regard to the former home in Tuam, we know that the site which was recently excavated by the commission is owned by Galway County Council. I have visited the site twice and it includes green spaces and children's play facilities alongside the memorial garden, which was maintained for years by local residents. The site was sealed and secured by the commission upon conclusion of its excavation. While the commission has advised that it has now concluded its physical excavations at Tuam, it has not yet reached any formal conclusions about the site.

In the first instance, the local coroner will wish to conclude his own formal processes and to decide on any further inquiries he may wish to make. While it will take some time to address all the questions which have arisen, I want to ensure that there is a sensitive and inclusive process of engagement with the local community, survivors and other parties with personal and family connections in respect of this site.

In the case of other relevant locations, the commission continues its work to examine the reporting of deaths and burial arrangements with regard to the 14 mother and baby homes and the identified sample of county homes. As an independent investigation, it is a matter for the commission to decide the approach it takes to these investigations. I have no role in these decisions. However, I am satisfied that the commission has sufficient powers, expertise and resources to progress these investigations in the public interest. It has clearly demonstrated that it can do so.

Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

I thank the Minister for her answer. This matter was the subject of the Private Members' motion we discussed last week, the fate of which is as yet unclear. It will be voted on on Thursday but may well be defeated. If it is defeated, will the Minister consider some of the valuable proposals in the motion? One proposal sought to put in place an injunction or possibly other means to ensure that these sites of possible interest are protected in order that they can be investigated. Notwithstanding the points the Minister made that the uses of some of the sites have changed and many of them have been closed for several decades, not all of them have been. Some of them were still open until the late 1980s and early 1990s and some remain as they were. While I accept that the commission has a specific role in the matter, it cannot put in place any injunction or take any executive action, for want of a better term, to ensure that the sites are not interfered with. That is purely the remit of the Government and it will have documentation from the commission of investigation to guide it in the manner in which it acts.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I am aware that the matter touches on the motion the Deputy tabled and I have already indicated in my response to the motion that it contains a number of proposals which I am considering and which we will facilitate and investigate. A certain amount of reflection and work is needed in order to make decisions to put in place the best response so that the whole truth is recovered.

Regarding the specific issue of an injunction, to which the Deputy refers in the question, I am advised that such applications cannot be sought on a preventative basis and that they are temporary in nature and used to prevent an imminent action from damaging the interests of the party who makes the application. I am not aware of specific circumstances in which such a consideration applies.

Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

I suggest that it would very likely be in the State's interest to intervene in situations in which there is a potential development in this regard, such as may be the case in a number of locations.

It is my understanding that the second interim report was before Cabinet this morning. On 27 July last year, the Minister issued a press release that stated that the commission was to report back in September. The Minister has committed to publishing such a report by the end of the month. It has still not been published, to my knowledge. I presume it will be published in the coming days. When does she intend to publish it? Furthermore, will the Minister outline the reason for the delay? The second interim report has been with her and her Department for some six months. This has caused a great deal of concern and anxiety among survivors. It is important we get a sense of the reason for the inordinate delay in the publication of the report. Furthermore, it has been reported that the report does not recommend an expansion of the terms of reference. This being the case, I believe that the commission is no longer fit for purpose.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I am interested in Deputy Ó Laoghaire's comments on this matter. However, I will bring my response back to his original question to me. I will take up some of the other issues later in response to other questions.

Again, regarding the question of making decisions to bring forward injunctions, the Deputy argues the Government has a responsibility to do so and that it is something we should consider. I am saying I am not necessarily unwilling to consider it but I understand from the advice I have received that in order to do so we need to have it brought to our attention that there are some real concerns about a preventative measure in respect of different sites that may require an injunction on the basis of people who have an interest in that regard. I am open to hearing from these people and reconsidering the issue.

Child Care Services Administration

Anne Rabbitte

Ceist:

18. Deputy Anne Rabbitte asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the status of the information technology infrastructure that will be used to deliver the single affordable child care scheme; her contingency plan if the information technology infrastructure is not ready by September 2017; if her attention has been drawn to the considerable inconvenience that a lack of infrastructure would cause parents and child care facilities alike; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [15425/17]

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

I ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the status of the information technology infrastructure that will be used to deliver the single affordable child care scheme and her contingency plan if the information technology infrastructure is not ready by September.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

Intense preparations are under way to deliver our ambitious goal of turning our child care system from one of the most expensive in the world to the best. What we are putting in place this year will benefit children and families for generations to come. It is vital we get this right. As the Deputy acknowledges, there is much work to do.

The Deputy is well aware, as a member of the Committee on Children and Youth Affairs, that the committee is involved in progressing the necessary legislation and there are business processes to be developed and data protection issues to address as well as a new and robust IT system.

We will need to integrate data from the Department of Social Protection and the Office of the Revenue Commissioners and testing of the systems will have to be rigorous. This system must work for all families, no matter their circumstances. Despite the huge workload, my officials and those in other Government Departments and Pobal are determined that families will start getting extra money this autumn. This is our top priority. In order to guarantee these payments, some other work will take longer than expected. For example, the fully automated system will not be ready when families start benefiting from the increased subsidies. We are working with Pobal to ensure that our interim measures will deliver without any excessive administrative burden.

I do not want to put any extra unnecessary work on parents or the dedicated providers. I fully recognise that people need information. In the next few weeks, I will be in a position to provide a detailed update on delivery plans. Full information will then be made available to the public. However, let me emphasise that this is a huge undertaking. A rushed system which does not work would be a major setback which could take years to correct.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

I thank the Minister for her comments. I hear what she is saying, that we will pay the price for a rushed effort in the long run. However, many parents and child care providers are asking what will happen in the interim, how they will avail of the scheme, how they will apply for it, where they will find the time to fill out the forms and, if self-employed, whether they will apply to the Revenue Commissioners, the Department of Social Protection or the Department of Children and Youth Affairs. Who will take ownership of the scheme in the interim? It is clear the priority is that the parents will be able to avail of the funding; how they will access it is the question. In the interim, it is back to paper, but who will take ownership? I assume the Department of Children and Youth Affairs will do so, but where will the parents go? Will they go to the child care provider again or will they have to sit at home and manually apply for the scheme? If they apply but do not have all the information, for example, from the Department of Social Protection or the Revenue Commissioners, where will the shortfall be caught from?

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I thank the Deputy for her questions. My Department is taking responsibility for the scheme and, as I have indicated, we intend within the next short while to outline our answers to all the questions the Deputy asks. I accept, and I appreciate that she accepts, that significant and complex work must be done in respect of the IT system and that in order to do it we need more time than we had anticipated. However, it is better to get it right because it is the basis for generations to come. In addition to continuing this substantial work, my Department has been engaged in developing a set of interim measures which we believe will work effectively to ensure that parents and providers will receive the moneys we have promised from September 2017. We will have a full information programme to identify the ways in which providers and parents will access this, and that delivery will be as streamlined as possible.

Deputy Anne Rabbitte

There is a comfort in the Minister's answer that her Department is taking ownership of the scheme. That is fantastic because hers is probably one of the hardest working Departments.

She is right that the work required is significant and very complex. However, the providers need to know when the parents come to them to ask questions and enrol in the scheme if they are to tell those parents through which office they will do so in the interim. What are we saying to the providers? Are we saying that funding could be found for them for extra non-contact hours? There will be a significant workload for them. Does the Department of Children and Youth Affairs have any plans to announce any extra little bit of funding so that they would be able to take on the extra workload that will now be put upon them?

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I will bring that question back to my officials as part of our lengthy discussions about the various issues. I appreciate what the Deputy is saying. The focus is not only on the interim measures being clearly communicated so that everybody knows what to do and where but that they will allow the money be delivered to providers and it is there for parents in September 2017. In addition, the focus of the work has been to ensure that the path we choose will have the smallest administrative burden possible. The way in which providers and parents engage will be different from when we have all the bells and whistles of the fully-built information technology, IT, system but we anticipate it will have the smallest administrative burden for both parties.

Child Care Services Staff

Kathleen Funchion

Ceist:

19. Deputy Kathleen Funchion asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the measures she is implementing as part of the new affordable child care scheme to tackle the issue of poor working conditions of the early years sector; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [15277/17]

Deputy Kathleen Funchion

I am sure the Minister is aware that working conditions for the early years sector are getting worse and while there are positive steps such as the introduction of the affordable childcare scheme and a welcome focus on improved standards to be introduced, I am concerned that there has not been sufficient consideration of the implications for the work force, that is, the increased administrative pressures and costs which are only set to grow. I am also very concerned that the voices and concerns of workers are not being heard throughout this whole process of change. What measures is the Minister implementing as part of the new affordable childcare scheme to tackle the problem of poor working conditions in the early years sector and the high turnover rate of staff and the acute staffing shortages?

Minister for Children and Youth Affairs

I accept that wages in the early years sector are unacceptably low and that working conditions are poor. This affects the quality of service offered to children. Addressing these issues is a priority concern for me as Minister for Children and Youth Affairs. As my Department is not the employer, however, I have no direct control over wages or working conditions.

Fundamentally, the problem relates to the historically low level of public investment in early years services. In last year’s budget, I secured an increase of 35% in funding for the early years sector and I shall keep pushing for further investment. The total level of investment is well below the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD, average of 0.8% of gross domestic product, GDP, and still further behind the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, UNICEF, recommendation of 1% of GDP to secure an early years system that is high quality, affordable and accessible for all.

Within my Department several changes have been implemented to support the professionalisation of the early years sector. For example, within the early childhood care and education, ECCE, programme, the higher capitation grant provides additional financial support where the preschool leader is qualified to national framework of qualifications, NFQ, level 7 or above. It is a measure that supports the employment of more highly qualified staff, though it cannot guarantee higher wages. To support higher qualifications, we have also recently awarded a learner fund bursary to assist attainment of level 7 and it is hoped to repeat this process for those graduating in time for the 2018 intake of children into those services.

The affordable childcare scheme will significantly increase the level of public investment in the sector and it will create a framework for further future investment.

To help support the future development of the affordable childcare scheme, as well as the ECCE programme, officials within the Department have commenced work on scoping the requirements to inform a tender process for the independent review of the cost of quality child care.

Deputy Kathleen Funchion

I thank the Minister for her answer and welcome her acknowledgement that wages in the sector are quite low. The Oireachtas Joint Committee on Children and Youth Affairs is preparing a report and I am its rapporteur. We have been speaking to workers throughout the country. The wages do not reflect the qualifications and expectations of those working in the sector. I understand there has been an increase in capitation rates but it is not enough. There are many young people coming through the system who want to stay in the child care profession but cannot because they are either on or under the minimum wage. Many are signing on during the summer months and some people are caught in an anomaly because they are considered self-employed but do not enjoy any of the benefits of being self-employed. There are many different angles on this. One of the key points workers in the sector make is that they do not want their voices to be forgotten in this affordable childcare scheme.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

It is great that the committee is doing this work because it provides another opportunity to hear those voices. I look forward to receiving the report because I know how committed the Deputy and her colleagues are in this regard.

I have also met with a range of representative bodies from the sector regarding the issue of wages and working conditions, including representatives from the Irish Municipal, Public and Civil Trade Union, IMPACT, and the Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union, SIPTU.

I have established the National Collaborative Forum for the Early Years Care and Education Sector, the early years forum, to allow issues of relevance to be discussed with key stakeholders. The forum has enabled consultation and engagement between me, key Department of Children and Youth Affairs officials, and key representatives of the sector. I have personally chaired the three meetings of the forum. At its second meeting, I requested that a section of the group's members meet up, outside the context of the forum, to discuss issues relating to wages, working conditions and the professionalisation of the sector and I look forward to hearing from them in that regard.

Deputy Kathleen Funchion

I welcome the fact that the Minister met the unions on this issue. As she acknowledges, underinvestment is the elephant in the room. Capitation rates are not high enough to subsidise an increase in pay for fair wages. What is the Minister's view of the introduction of a fair pay scale or a living wage? Would she and the Department support that? Government should advocate that all contracts costed by the State should provide at least for a living wage and this should begin with the affordable childcare scheme. Built into this should be a requirement that it is passed on to the workforce employed to deliver the service. A part of the concern is that the increase in capitation rates will not be passed on as wages because many services are not even ticking over and cannot afford to pass on that increase. We propose that it would be passed on to the workforce.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I am aware of the low wages in the sector. I am aware that the average wage is only just above the minimum wage and is below the living wage. I have done a lot of work in my political life to encourage us to move towards the living wage and would love to see the early years and education and care sector become an example of that, especially when 18% of staff are now qualified to level 7 or above on the national framework of qualifications yet they are generally receiving payments of €11 per hour for room leaders, €10.56 for educators and assistants and €13.87 for managers. I am not, however, directly responsible because I am not their employer but we have found very innovative ways of trying to provide investment in the people who are working there, as well as thinking of ways to ensure that somehow these can be passed on and supported by the people who are working. There is much farther to go in that regard.

Mother and Baby Homes Inquiries

Jan O'Sullivan

Ceist:

20. Deputy Jan O'Sullivan asked the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if she will publish the second interim report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes; if she, in conjunction with her Government colleagues, is considering the establishment of a redress scheme for survivors; if in the meantime there is a contact point for information and support for those whose lives have been affected by mother and baby homes and other institutions in which unmarried mothers gave birth; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [15423/17]

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan

In her speech on 9 March last the Minister indicated that she would publish the second interim report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes by the end of the month, which is this Friday. Is there a proposal to establish a redress scheme and information for people who may have been very disturbed by the fact that they may have a personal connection with a mother and baby home?

Minister for Children and Youth Affairs

I thank the Deputy for her question and am very conscious that it has not been possible to publish the second interim report so far. This is for very good reasons and I can assure the House that I have no wish whatsoever to delay it unnecessarily. I want to publish this report as soon as possible and I briefed the Cabinet on the matter again this morning. I expect to be able to clarify the timeframe for completion of the Government's deliberative process within the coming week.

As I have previously outlined, given the wide remit of the commission's work, it has been necessary for me to engage with Cabinet colleagues on issues in the report which extend beyond my remit as Minister for Children and Youth Affairs. I acknowledge that the process has taken longer than I initially envisaged. I am very sensitive to the expectations of former residents and their advocates who want to see the contents of the report.

I do not believe it would be helpful today to respond to media speculation on the contents of the report in advance of the full report being made public. Publishing the report has been the focus of my approach since I received it from the commission. It is open to the commission to recommend any remedies it deems appropriate in light of the findings of its final reports.

My Department will contact representative groups to advise of developments in this regard prior to any public announcement.

I can assure Deputies that the time being taken by Government to consider this interim report is not hindering progress in the commission's ongoing investigations.

My Department has an information line in operation to provide factual information in regard to the commission's remit and its reports to date. This line is open during office hours and relevant details are available on my Department's website. There is also a telephone line available for people seeking details of the support available to those affected by these issues.

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan

I thank the Minister for the last part of her reply regarding available information and telephone lines.

I am very concerned that the timeline for publication will not be met. The Minister said in the Dáil that she would be publishing the second interim report of the commission by the end of this month. The Minister's answer indicates that will not be the case. The report has been with the Minister for eight months, since 27 July. Reading between the lines, there appears to be something in the recommendations that the Government is not keen to implement, such as a proposal for a redress scheme or similar. I may be wrong about that.

I urge the Minister to publish the interim report. There are many people whose lives have been turned upside down by the information that came out in Tuam and who are very concerned.

I also ask the Minister about the scoping exercise that she said she would carry out regarding the expansion of the terms of reference of the commission of investigation.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I know exactly what I said in the Dáil. It is a great disappointment to me that I will not be able to deliver on that by the end of this month. The extension is due to the time required to respond to some of the report's recommendations in a different way than perhaps has been done in the past. This has proven extremely challenging.

I am very happy to say that there is significant engagement across Government Departments to find that way. I am having more meetings this week. As I said before, I hope I will soon be able to indicate when I will be ready.

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan

In the interests of transparency and public knowledge, would the Minister consider publishing the report even if she has not got the full Government response? People are entitled to see what is in the report. The Minister could explain that it is possible to respond to certain areas but that a response has not yet been formulated in regard to other areas. I think that would be the right thing to do. I ask the Minister to consider that.

Deputy Katherine Zappone

I am being transparent in terms of the process. I appreciate that people would like to see it as soon as possible. I understand that as well as anyone in this Chamber because of the work that I have been doing on that report in regard to a number of survivors and advocates. It has probably taken more of my time in the past couple of months than anything else in the Department. In my discernment, I have decided it is more helpful if the Government can have a little more time to formulate a plan for responding to the recommendations of the commission. I appreciate that Deputy Jan O'Sullivan may disagree but that is my discernment.

Dáil Éireann díospóireacht - Tuesday, 28 Mar 2017