Childcare Services
Dail Éireann — 2020-10-20
============================================================

Roderic O'Gorman (GP), Dublin West

I cannot disagree with anything the Deputy said. I am not making excuses but there is a context in terms of Covid-19 whereby a significant change is being made to a system. Training and significant online seminars were provided to providers but, understandably, many of the latter were focused on reopening, putting in place the Perspex screens and spending the capital grants we had given them to get their services ready for the return to childcare. There were delays in answering emails, and I am aware there was a definite issue with the phone. My sense from engagement with them is that many of those issues have been resolved at this stage. If Deputy Whitmore or any other Deputies know of situations where there are significant problems, they should let my officials know and we will try to address them. I know how stressful this period has been for childcare providers. They led the way back to reopening and we have to support them as much as possible.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2020-10-20/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:48:42+00:00
Sitting date: 2020-10-20