Dáil Éireann Debate, Monday - 7 September 2026
2824. Deputy Barry Ward asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality the position regarding the mechanism in place that seeks to bring childcare facilities that have left the core funding model back into the scheme. [59577/26]
Amharc ar fhreagraI am aware that a small number of services have regrettably chosen to withdraw from Core Funding.
The Department, through the local Childcare Committees (CCCs), engages directly with any such service to highlight the benefits of staying in Core Funding, not only for their service but also for the families who avail of them. I remain hopeful that the providers may reconsider their decision.
Core Funding is a supply-side grant to early learning and childcare providers towards their operating costs. It is designed to promote affordability for parents and sustainability for providers through increased funding to the sector, paid on a consistent and equitable basis.
As Core Funding is an optional scheme, service providers have the autonomy and business freedom to withdraw from or choose not to participate in Core Funding.
While the Department cannot mandate providers to participate in the Scheme, every effort has been made to carefully design Core Funding to meet the policy objectives including to achieve high levels of participation by providers.
When first introduced in 2022, Core Funding brought a significant increase in investment for the sector with an annual allocation of €259 million. That annual allocation has increased each year since and will exceed €390 million for year 4 of the Scheme, starting from September. This represents an increase of over 50% in Core Funding in three years.
Within the Core Funding allocation for the 2025/26 programme year, €45 million has been ringfenced to support employers in meeting the costs of further increases to the minimum rates of pay in the sector, as set out under the Employment Regulation Orders.
The total allocation for Core Funding in 2026/2027 programme year will increase to over €480 million, an increase of over €90 million, or 23%, on the current full year allocation.
This increased investment will allow for further increases in capacity across the sector, with over €21 million specifically set aside to support Partner Services in adhering to enhanced Core Funding fee management conditions, from September 2026.
The increased allocation also includes up to a maximum of €45 million to support providers to meet possible additional cost of increases in minimum rates of pay for early years educators and school-age childcare practitioners through independently negotiated rates of pay by the early years services Joint Labour Committee.
Consequently, over 2 years, the Department has made an allocation of €90 million available to support possible increased rates of pay.
The Department has also made changes to improve the sustainability of providers through, for example, targeted measures for small and sessional services, and a fee increase assessment and approval process for services with fees frozen at unsustainably low rates.
Participation in Core Funding also unlocks access to enhanced support for services caring for concentrated numbers of children facing disadvantage. Equal Start is a funding model and set of associated universal and targeted measures to support access and meaningful participation in early learning and care (ELC) and school-age childcare (SAC) for children and their families who experience disadvantage.
Partner Services also have access to Building Blocks capital grants. The Building Blocks Capital Programme is designed to support early learning and childcare services to expand their existing facilities by creating additional, full time, early learning and care spaces.
There are also wider financial supports available from the Department where a service is experiencing financial difficulty or has concerns about their viability, which can be accessed through their local City/County Childcare Committee while remaining within Core Funding.
Participation in Core Funding is optional, but it remains open to all Tusla registered providers, subject to their agreement to the terms and conditions of the Core Funding Agreement. It is a matter for providers to decide whether they wish to sign up to Core Funding and benefit from the significant financial supports it offers to providers and the certainty it gives to parents through the associated fee management measures.
I would encourage any service experiencing difficulty and who would like support to contact their CCC to access case management supports. Contact details for all City and County Childcare Committees are available on the gov.ie website.
It should be noted that currently, services that provide the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) programme and/or the National Childcare Scheme (NCS) are not required to take part in Core Funding, reducing the impact of the NCS as some families are not benefiting from the fee-control measures (fee-freeze and fee caps) or additional funding for quality provision that is provided by Core Funding. This will also be the case for the coming programme year 2026/2027.
To deliver on the Programme for Government commitment to progressively reduce parental fees to €200 per month, the Phase 1 report of Shaping the Future states that Phase 2 will set out a roadmap to ensure that all publicly funded providers are supported to take part in Core Funding.
Phase 2 of Shaping the Future is in development and will be published by year end.
