QUESTION NO: 216 to the Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children (Mr. Andrews) for WRITTEN ANSWER on 28/04/2009
* To ask the Minister for Health and Children the funding made available and due to be made available in 2009 through the national childcare investment programme through capital and other types of grants; and if she will make a statement on the matter. – David Stanton T.D.
REPLY
As the Deputy will be aware I have responsibility for the National Childcare Investment Programme (NCIP) 2006-2010.
The NCIP was initially allocated capital funding of €378 million to cover a five year period up until the end of 2010. Capital expenditure in the region of €170 million has been provided to support childcare developments in the private and community childcare sector since the programme was introduced in 2006. However, with the economic downturn and a resulting decrease in the numbers of children attending pre-school services it is not proposed to approve any new capital grant applications this year or in 2010. The investment to date is expected to create more than 25,000 additional childcare places.
Funding amounting to almost €160 million has been made available to support the Community Childcare Subvention Scheme (CCSS) which was introduced in January 2008 and will run until the end of 2010. Funding provided under this scheme amounted to €52 million in 2008 and is expected to increase to €56 million in 2009. This extra funding is necessary to provide for new services participating in the scheme and for additional parents using childcare services.
Funding of €1million has been provided to the County Childcare Committees for 2009 to support the National Childminding Initiative and a further €0.25 million has been allocated to the Parent and Toddler initiative under the programme
