Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 19 May 2026
929. Deputy Barry Ward asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the position regarding mechanisms in place to ensure that childcare providers are meeting their service obligations; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37687/26]
Amharc ar fhreagra930. Deputy Barry Ward asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the mechanisms in place when a childcare provider is not meeting their service obligations on a consistent basis; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37688/26]
Amharc ar fhreagraI propose to take Questions Nos. 929 and 930 together.
Tusla Early Years Inspectorate, the independent statutory regulator for the sector, is responsible for the implementation of Part VIIA of the Child Care Act 1991. This includes the registration and the inspection of services in line with preschool, school age, and childminding regulations. Inspection reports for registered services are published and available at: www.tusla.ie/services/preschool-services/creche-inspection-reports/.
Under the regulations, a service is required to have a complaints policy and procedure in place. The complaints policy must specify how?the complaint will be dealt with by the service and the procedures in place for keeping the complainant informed regarding how the complaint is being managed. The registered provider is also required to keep a written record of all complaints; this record must state how the complaint is managed and the record of complaints must be available for inspection by Tusla Early Years Inspectorate.
If the complaint has not been satisfactorily addressed through the services’ complaints policy and procedures or if the concern cannot be resolved, Tusla EYI, through their feedback and concerns mechanism may be contacted. Further information and contact details are available at: www.tusla.ie/services/preschool-services/parents-guardians/concerned-about-an-early-years-service/.
Enforcement of the regulations is also carried out by the Inspectorate with the primary aim of ensuring services are operating safely and appropriately for children in all services under its remit. The Child Care (Amendment) Act 2024 has given Tusla EYI additional enforcement powers where safety and compliance issues are identified in a service. These include:
• Immediate closure powers for unregistered services.
• Ability to request and acquire parents’ contact details.
• Immediate temporary closure powers for services where there is or there is likely to be grave and/or immediate danger to the health and safety of children.
• Extension of the ‘fit person’ regulation to registered providers and persons-in-charge in centre-based ELC and SAC services.
• Putting on a statutory footing ‘immediate action notices’ and ‘improvement notices’.
In addition, the Department oversees a comprehensive onsite inspection process in which early learning and childcare services in receipt of funding under one of the Department’s schemes are inspected by Pobal Visiting Officers.
Compliance Inspections by Pobal are a key priority area for the schemes/programmes under the Department's remit. There are several main purposes of Compliance visits. One purpose is to protect exchequer funding. Another is to protect service users. There are checks that services are adhering to scheme rules in areas such as fees, staff qualifications and educator: child ratios.
Overall, the annual number of services in receipt of inspection checks equates to approximately 20 percent of all services. The inspection profile coverage includes a large percentage of what are deemed to be higher risk services as well as random inspections and referrals. Inspections are unannounced to provide a realistic view of day-to-day operations and reduce any potential manipulation or concealment.
Inspections also check that all staff in the service have the necessary staff qualifications as per Tusla regulations and any instances of staff found working without the required qualifications are escalated to Tusla.
The Department funds 30 City/County Childcare Committees (CCCs) to act as its local agent in the delivery of the national early learning and childcare programmes and the implementation of Government policy.
The role of the CCC is to provide support and guidance to local service providers and parents in relation to the various early learning and childcare programmes and support quality in keeping with national practice frameworks and policy objectives.
CCC act as local agents for the Department in:
• Supporting families in accessing early learning and childcare services;
• Supporting early learning and childcare services regarding quality of provision, compliance with programme rules and new service providers in their start-up;
• Delivering training and continuing professional development opportunities for providers and their staff;
• Identifying and assisting the Department in resolving supply management issues at a local level;
• Supporting implementation of the National Action Plan for Childminding at local level and administering the Childminding Development Grants funded by the Department.
