Childcare Services
Dail Éireann — 2026-06-23
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Claire Kerrane (SF), Roscommon-Galway

I know I am like a broken record, but it would be remiss of me not to mention Boyle in north Roscommon. The needs analysis, which was very well done, showed that the national benchmark is 20 childcare places per 75 households. In the town of Boyle and in the surrounding rural area, there are 20 childcare places per 1,043 households. There is a real need in Boyle, and that has been proven through the needs analysis I shared with the Minister and the forward planning unit, which very kindly gave us an extremely helpful briefing this morning on the model.
A former childcare facility on the outskirts of Boyle has become available again. It was available and then it was not. It is now available again. The childcare committee has passed on the information in that regard. We have a unique opportunity now. It is a purpose-built facility and is ready to go. That is a project that really needs to be looked at in terms of the eight overall projects. Again, I would love to see building blocks extended. We have so many empty buildings in the State. Let us use them for childcare and for communities.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-06-23/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:06+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-23