The local media, with some prompting from Fine Gael, have been claiming that the New Year will herald a childcare crisis that will see working parents paying more for childcare in order to subsidize parents in receipt of income support.

This is not true. You can download the fact sheet on the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme from here:

http://www.omc.gov.ie/documents/publications/CCSFactsheet.pdf

It isn’t really may place to defend the Government on this one, but I pay childcare myself, and I don’t think parents should be led to believe that costs are going to increase because of social welfare changes.

I’ve released the following Press Release:

Green Party representative in Co. Leitrim Garreth McDaid has claimed that recent media coverage of the introduction of the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme is misleading in suggesting that the scheme will lead to extra costs for working parents.

Mr. McDaid was referring to the suggestion that the introduction of reduced fees for parents availing of income support would lead to higher fees for parents who are not in receipt of support.

Mr. McDaid said: “It is simply not the case that reducing fees for one group of parents will lead to higher fees for other parents. A community-based facility that is required to charge certain parents lower fees will be fully subsidized for those reduced fees, so there will be no reduction in income for that facility. It is to provide this subsidy that the scheme is being introduced.”

Mr. McDaid also rejected the suggestion that community based childcare facilities will receive lower grant assistance under the scheme.

“€565 million, including €358 million in capital funding, has been allocated to the National Childcare Investment Programme for the period 2006-2010. No changes have been made to this budget as a result of the introduction of the new scheme. The new scheme is designed specifically to assist parents on lower incomes; it is not concerned with capital funding.”

Referring to concerns expressed by the Leitrim Community Childcare Network, Mr. McDaid said that the issue of segregation between community based and private childcare facilities required constant review, but that it was not the case that applicants under the new scheme were not subject to quality assessment.

“The new scheme will require applicants to meet 10 quality benchmarks across of a range of disciplines. There should be no deterioration in the quality of community based childcare as a result of the new scheme.”