Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 26 September 2023
502. Deputy Ivana Bacik asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he will make a statement on the practice of childcare operators who are signed up to core funding charging parents administrative costs and for purchase and use of equipment at early years facilities. [41614/23]
View answerTogether for Better, the new funding model, is about getting the most out of the three Early Learning and Childcare programmes, ECCE including AIM, NCS and Core Funding, working together and ensuring stability and sustainability in the sector. Together for Better is already delivering substantial benefits for children, parents, staff and providers and I am very proud of the significant achievements in its first year of operation. Investment in early learning and childcare is at unprecedented levels with public funding for the first time reaching more than €1 billion in 2023 for early learning and childcare – a clear demonstration from Government of the value of the sector.
For year 1 of the new Core Funding scheme, €259m was made available. For year 2 of this scheme, €287m is being made available. The additional €28 million – equivalent to 11% increase - is being allocated as follows:
• €8.47m for a 3% growth in capacity.
• €6.11m for non-staff overheads.
• €2.2m for administrative staff time.
• €4m for graduate premiums
• €7.22m for new targeted measures aimed at improving the sustainability of sessional services.
Core Funding allows for substantial increases in the total cost base for the sector, related both to pay and non-pay costs, without additional costs being passed on to parents.
Core 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 administration and to support the employment of graduate staff.
As a condition of receiving Core Funding, Partner Services must uphold their contractual obligations regarding their fees charged to parents/guardians as laid out in the Core Funding Partner Service Funding Agreement. This includes agreement not to increase the fee for any Service Type which was extant on September 30th 2021 or introduce an extra charge for any component of an unchanged Service Type. An increased charge of any kind for an existing and unchanged Service Type will be in breach of Core Funding rules.
One of the key features of Core Funding is the introduction of a system of fee management, to ensure that affordability measures are passed on to parents/guardians. To achieve this, Core Funding introduced a fee freeze for the September 2022 - August 2023 programme year.
The Core Funding fee management system aims to ensure that affordability measures are passed on to parents/guardians. Where a parent or guardian identifies a case of a potential breach of Core Funding fee rules, they may seek to have this examined and a conclusion reached through the Core Funding Fee Review process.
As outlined in the Together for Better - Guidelines on Fee Management Documents, additional services Partner Services can continue to offer services in addition to early learning and childcare are subject to the following conditions;
• Partner Services cannot introduce or extract an extra charge for any Additional Service (such as meals) which was included in the fees on 30 September 2021.
• Any new Additional Services can be charged for, with fees set at the provider’s discretion, but they must be genuinely optional for the parent (e.g. if a service begins offering meals where it had not before, it may charge for these but must allow parents/guardians to supply a packed meal instead).
• If an additional service charge is introduced to fund a tour or outing, for example, a parent must be able to refuse this offer on the basis that they will still receive the early learning and childcare they would be entitled to if the tour or outing had not taken place.
• Additional Services cannot be added to ECCE-only Service Type, these can only offer Optional Extras as defined in the DCEDIY Childcare Funding Programmes Optional Extras Guide.
I would encourage Parents/Guardians experiencing difficulty in relation to understanding the fees charged by their Partner Service to contact their local City/County Childcare Committee (CCC) for assistance. Contact details for CCCs may be found on www.myccc.ie .
