Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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1. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the action he is taking to build capacity in the childcare sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [38966/24]

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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My question is about capacity in the childcare sector. There are major deficiencies, with thousands of children without a childcare place. What actions does the Minister intend to take to build capacity urgently in the sector?

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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My Department delivers capital funding to the sector to support capacity growth. This year, the building blocks expansion scheme is funding reconfigurations of services to enable them to increase the number of places, particularly for one- to three-year-olds. I will launch the building blocks extension scheme soon, which will make €25 million available next year in large-scale capital grants for services to undertake building projects to increase their capacity. Again, this will primarily be focused on places for one- to three-year-olds. Funding will also be available to existing community services to purchase or construct new premises.

The flagship core funding scheme, which began in 2022, is designed to support services with costs of delivery. Between year one and year two of the scheme, the number of hours of services delivered annually increased by almost 8%. Further capacity growth of approximately 6% is built into the forecasting of the scheme for year three, which began earlier this month.

The outcome from the joint labour committee, JLC, process continues to be supported by the Government through core funding. In budget 2025, I secured an additional €15 million to support employers to meet the costs of further increases to the minimum rates of pay in the sector. This translates into full-year costs of €45 million. Recruiting and retaining staff is crucially important to maintaining and growing capacity. In addition, I am increasing the availability of regulated and subsidised early learning and childcare. Following the commencement of new regulations on 30 September, parents who use childminders will soon be able to access the national childcare scheme.

It is important that we develop a detailed and nuanced understanding of the nature of supply and demand at local area level. To this end, I have initiated work on a forward planning model that will identify the number of early learning and childcare places in different categories in each service, whether or not those places are occupied and how that aligns with the numbers of children in the corresponding age cohorts at local level.

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Minister. The first point he made relates to capital expenditure and the provision of extensions and new builds under the building blocks scheme. However, the 33,000 children who need a childcare place today cannot wait for the capital projects and extensions, which, in many cases, I presume, will require planning permission. Some providers have the physical space needed but they have closed rooms because they cannot get the staff. They physically cannot staff those rooms. In order to build capacity, we really need, number one, to look at the wages in the sector and we also must be innovative in looking at existing buildings. As I have said previously, I can think of several community centres in my own area that are either vacant all of the time or underused during the day. We need to look at existing buildings in our communities, which could be used as shared spaces, rather than looking for capital funding and planning permission to build. The other issue is buildings that have already been built as part of housing developments but are left idle.

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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I might return in my next contribution to the last issue the Deputy raised. Regarding capital, we announced a capital scheme in 2023 that was drawn down this year. That will already be delivering additional places. The Deputy is absolutely right regarding existing buildings. The new capital scheme I am set to announce in the next number of weeks will allow community services, in particular, to purchase existing buildings. They might be unused ones, as she mentioned, or buildings that were provided in housing developments. The scheme was designed to be flexible to allow for that. Community services can get the full cost of the buildings for private providers. It is a 50:50 arrangement, which is an appropriate division between the State stepping up with support and private providers bringing some resources themselves.

The Deputy is right on staff funding. In the budget announced yesterday, we have made provision for a pay increase next year. It is dependent on the employment regulation order, ERO, and on us making sure all staff get the benefit of that through a pay increase. The Government has financed two pay increases through an ERO process. They were the first ever mandated pay increases for early learning professionals.

Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein)
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I acknowledge that. However, the last pay increase that was achieved was 65 cent. It took 14 months to negotiate it. It could not be done around the table, with workers having to seek assistance from the Labour Court. If they wait another 14 months and get about 60 cent, we will lose the early years educators we desperately need from the sector. There are childcare places that would be available if the providers could staff the rooms, particularly baby rooms. I have seen that in my county of Roscommon, where baby rooms have been closed because the providers cannot get the staff. If we have to wait 14 months for a pay increase for early years educators, given the rise in the living wage that is coming, there will be about 15 cent in the difference between the minimum rate for those workers and the living wage. That is of huge concern if we are to build capacity within the sector.

I welcome what the Minister said in regard to existing buildings. That really needs to be looked at in terms of building capacity and doing so quickly. Using existing buildings is the quickest way to build capacity, particularly in rural areas where it may not be viable for a provider to operate or no provider exists.

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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As the Deputy knows, the JLC process is an independent process. We have improved it by the State stepping up and saying clearly to the parties that if they get a pay agreement, we will back it up in terms of meeting some of the extra wage costs for providers. It was disappointing that it took 14 months last time. I was very clear in what I announced yesterday that the allocation for staff pay is dependent on the ERO. The money will only flow to the services if we have that ERO in place. People working in the services say to me when I meet them that staffing is their biggest pressure. We are stepping up with money to support staff pay but I am very clear that we need the ERO in place. We are saying this now to ensure there is plenty of time for the process to kick-start and deliver on time. I and whoever succeeds me in my role must be very clear that we want to support that. As we go forward on an annual basis, we hope to provide an additional core funding allocation just for pay, which will subsequently translate into a pay increase for our amazing childcare professionals.