Launch of the Draft Childminding Action Plan

Check against delivery

It gives me great pleasure to be here today to launch the Draft Childminding Action Plan, and to launch a public consultation on the Draft Plan.

Childminding is of huge importance to children, to parents, to our economy, and to our society. But until now it has not received the support it deserves in our public funding or our system of regulation. This Draft Action Plan aims to recognise the valuable work that childminders do and to ensure they can access the supports they need. The Draft Action Plan sets out positive reform proposals to bring childminding into the mainstream of regulation, funding and support.

I am delighted that we have some childminders with us today. I am sure it was not easy for you to make the time to be here given your daily work. I know that many other childminders would be here if we had been able to hold this event in the evening or at a weekend, which unfortunately was not possible.

But I can assure childminders that the consultation process I am launching today will be centred around childminders’ hours of work, and my officials will do all they can to make sure childminders can take part.

“Childminding is different” – that is the headline of a campaign that Childminding Ireland is running at the moment. And it’s true! Childminding is different in many ways from the “centre-based” provision of early learning and care and school-age childcare:

• childminding takes place in the home (or it may be on the beach, in the playground or at the post office – wherever the childminder and children choose to go)
• childminding is small in scale – on average there are about 4 children with a childminder, and there are often just one or two children
• childminding offers consistency of care and a close, lasting relationship – a childminder works on her own (or on his own), caring for the same small group of children all day, every day, often for many years
• and it is flexible – a childminder who works with just one or two families may be able to meet those families’ particular needs

But, while recognising that childminding is different, some things must be the same:

• I want to ensure that parents who use childminders can access the same subsidies that are available to parents who use centre-based services
• I want to ensure that childminders can access supports and funding opportunities to the same extent as those who work in centre-based services
• and I want to ensure that children attending childminders benefit from the same safeguards that are in place for children attending centre-based services (though, of course, we need to keep strengthening those safeguards, and I will say more about that in a moment)

Right now there are only 81 childminders registered with Tusla. We don’t know how many childminders there are in the country, but for sure the number is in the thousands. I have taken recent steps to increase the number of Tusla-registered childminders, including appointing a National Childminding Coordinator (who began work in March), establishing a “Learner Fund” for childminders (the application window for the first round of the Learner Fund opened last week), and providing funds for a team of regional Childminding Development Officers (recruitment for which is under way right now).

But the reality is that the number of Tusla-registered childminders will only increase significantly when we remove the legal exemptions that are in the Child Care Act 1991 and introduce new Regulations that are proportionate and appropriate to the home setting and the family context in which childminders work. Those legal reforms are a central pillar of this Draft Childminding Action Plan.

The National Childcare Scheme will launch in the coming months. Only Tusla-registered providers will be able to take part, and only parents who use Tusla-registered providers will benefit. That is essential if we are to provide assurance to parents and accountability in the use of public funds. So if we want childminders to be at the heart of the National Childminding Scheme (and doing so is in the interests of childminders, of parents, and of children), then we need to bring childminders in to the sphere of regulation and of registration with Tusla.

In September 2016 I established a Working Group on Reforms and Supports for the Childminding Sector. The Working Group’s report was published last year. When I spoke at the launch of that report I thanked the members of the Working Group for the huge effort and care they had put in. I would like to repeat my thanks now, and I would particularly like to thank the Chairperson of that Working Group, Bernadette Burke, who is here beside me and who will be speaking shortly.

And I would like to assure the members of the Working Group, many of whom are in this room, that the fruits of their labour can be clearly seen in the Draft Childminding Action Plan I am launching today.

There are many excellent proposals in this Draft Action Plan, and I will leave it to others who are speaking this morning to go through the details. But I want to say a few words on the time-scale for the proposed reforms.

This is a 10-year plan of action. In line with the Working Group’s recommendations, the Draft Action Plan proposes a phased approach to reform. In the first instance, before the legal exemptions from regulation are removed, we need to get the Regulations right – we need to make changes to ensure the Regulations are proportionate and appropriate for childminders. And we need to give childminders time to adjust to any changes that are introduced. We also need time to develop supports and training that are tailored to childminders’ needs.

Phase One of the Action Plan, then, is all about putting the building blocks in place – through research, development, and extensive consultation with childminders – so that when new Regulations come into force for childminders (in Phase Two of the Action Plan) the Regulations are well-designed and childminders are ready for them.

There is of course a balance to be struck here. While the Draft Action Plan proposes a phased approach over a number of years, I also want to push for changes to happen as soon as possible. Childminders – and the parents who use childminders – have waited long enough already for these reforms. And the opening of the National Childcare Scheme is a huge opportunity that we must not miss. We need to act soon if we are to ensure that childminders can take part in the National Childcare Scheme with the least possible delay.

There is also an urgency to take actions in response to the RTÉ investigation, Behind Closed Doors, that was broadcast a few weeks ago. That programme, of course, focused on the provider of a centre-based childcare service, not a childminder. But, for all of us who watched, it highlighted the vulnerability of very young children, and how important is the trust that young children and their parents place in the children’s carers. The programme also offered lessons that are relevant to all those who provide early learning and care services for very young children, for those who support and regulate those services, and for policy makers.

We have made huge strides over the last number of years in progressing the quality agenda and it is critical that we maintain this momentum.

We have introduced a minimum qualification requirement for staff. We have established the “Better Start” Quality Development Service that provides mentoring and training to providers. We have expanded the Inspectorate, and the number of inspections carried out by Tusla each year is nearly double what it was 5 years ago. We have created a register of providers, and given Tusla the power to deregister providers and to attach conditions to their registration. We have introduced “education-focused inspections” that are carried out by the Department of Education and Skills on behalf of my department. However, the RTÉ investigation showed that there is much more we still need to do.

As I have said many times, my priority is to transform Ireland’s early learning and care and school-age childcare system from being one of the most expensive internationally, to one of the best. I am committed to continuing to improve access, affordability and – crucially – the quality of provision.

In the days following the RTÉ broadcast, I announced my intention to strengthen Tusla’s powers, and I wrote to the Chairperson of Tusla asking his view of what additional powers Tusla might need and how to increase transparency in relation to issues uncovered during inspections. I believe we will need to give Tusla new powers to close a service immediately where it has failed to register or where Tusla has evidence of very serious breaches of Regulations.

I also believe we need to require all services to display their registration status prominently, and we need to find ways to increase the transparency of the inspection process and to ensure Tusla can inform parents as early as possible regarding on-going investigations.

The Chairperson of Tusla has since written back to me, and officials in my department are currently examining his proposals and considering the legal implications. While it is too early to be specific, it is clear that primary legislation will have to be amended to give effect to the reforms. I have urged my officials to move as fast as possible in bringing forward draft legislation.

Additional powers for Tusla must form part of a multi-faceted approach that also includes: movement towards the establishment of a regulator for the profession; additional training for those working in the sector, with a renewed focus on the child protection training that is already under way; strengthened advisory supports before and after inspections; review of our supports for the Garda Vetting process for the sector; the introduction of full regulations and a quality improvement framework for school-age childcare; and additional information for parents.

In short, we need a full Programme of Quality Reforms, that builds on the quality agenda we have been successfully pursuing over recent years, and that strives to ensure we never again see scenes like those we saw in the RTÉ documentary. Many of the actions we need to take are already set out in First 5, our Whole-of-Government Strategy for Babies, Young Children and their Families, but the RTÉ investigation showed the urgency of those actions. I have asked my officials to examine ways to accelerate many of these reforms.

Given the urgency of reform, changes will be made in the very short term wherever this is possible. But we need to take care to get the detail right, and on some aspects of legal and regulatory reform it will be important that we carry out consultation on the detail before we introduce changes.

The regulation of childminding – which is what we are here to discuss today – must be one central strand in the Quality Reform Programme. And the importance of public consultation before engaging in regulatory reform is particularly evident in relation to childminding.

As I stated earlier, today I am launching not just a Draft Action Plan, but a public consultation on that Draft Action Plan. The public consultation begins today and will run through until the middle of October.

Two elements of the consultation process are open as of this morning: a call for submissions, and an online survey. Both will be available on my department’s website today. Two other key elements of the consultation process will take place during October: a series of focus groups of childminders, and an Open Policy Debate. Dates for these will be announced in due course.

We need to get this Action Plan right – for the sake of children, childminders, and parents. So your participation in the consultation process – and the participation of childminders and parents around the country – will be crucial to its success. I encourage you all to work with us over the coming weeks as we consult widely on the Draft Childminding Action Plan.

Thank you.

ENDS