Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 28 January 2026
167. Deputy Joanna Byrne asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the number of early learning and childcare providers in County Louth signed up to Government core funding scheme in each of the years 2021 to 2025 respectively. [6680/26]
Amharc ar fhreagra168. Deputy Joanna Byrne asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the number of early learning and childcare providers in County Louth which withdrew from the Government's core funding scheme in each of the years 2021 to 2025 respectively. [6681/26]
Amharc ar fhreagra169. Deputy Joanna Byrne asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the number of early learning and childcare providers in County Louth which are currently signed up to the Government core funding scheme. [6682/26]
Amharc ar fhreagraI propose to take Questions Nos. 167, 168 and 169 together.
In total, data from Pobal confirms that, as of 26 January, there are 113 providers operating in Co. Louth, 109 of whom are in receipt of Core Funding – representing a 96.46% county-wide take-up rate of Core Funding.
The table below provides a breakdown of Core Funding uptake and eligibility in Co. Louth at similar points in each year since Core Funding was launched in September 2022.
|
Date |
Contracted |
Eligible |
Uptake (percentage) |
|
30/01/2023 |
106 |
108 |
98% |
|
29/01/2024 |
107 |
109 |
98% |
|
27/01/2025 |
106 |
108 |
98% |
|
26/01/2026 |
109 |
113 |
96% |
In the interest of clarity, transparency and consistent reporting, I have defined a service that left Core Funding as any service that had a gap between contracts for Core Funding of 4 or more weeks. There are a number of reasons that a service might fall into this definition. For example, a service could have withdrawn from the scheme, been removed from the scheme for breach of rules, or experienced a delay in re-contracting following a change of circumstance application or between programme years. Many services have left and later re-joined the scheme. There may be a small number of services who left the scheme and subsequently closed at a later date and are not captured in the figures below.
The table below provides a breakdown of the services in Louth that left Core Funding in each programme year by county division. Some services may have left and rejoined multiple times across the three years, and therefore the figures cannot be summed across programme years from the breakdown below.
|
COUNTY DIVISION |
Year 1 (2022/2023) |
Year 2 (2023/2024) |
Year 3 (2024/2025) |
Year 4 (2025/2026) |
|
County Louth |
6 |
2 |
3 |
0 |
Uptake of Core Funding remains strong. As of 26 January, 4,599 have signed up to the fourth year of Core Funding which represents 93% of all eligible services. This is the highest number of Partner Services in Core Funding at any point since the scheme was launched in 2022 and the number continues to grow.
