Early Childhood Care and Education
Dail Éireann — 2025-11-12
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Claire Kerrane (SF), Roscommon-Galway

I welcome all of those measures and any measure announced for the early years sector that will make a difference. One of the biggest issues we have in the early years sector right now is capacity. We have serious issues in terms of capacity, whether it is capacity in baby rooms or capacity in childcare places at every level right across the State. As far as I am concerned, when we need 40,000 to 50,000 childcare places, we are in a crisis. I had hoped the building blocks grant would have been expanded. I have raised with the Minister many times the need for that to be expanded to allow new providers as well as existing providers to purchase existing buildings, of which there are many in all of our counties. That would build capacity very quickly. It would be cheaper and more environmentally friendly to use what we have.
There are areas in communities that have high demand for childcare and extensions to schools and community centres will not cut it for them.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-11-12/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-21T01:01:05+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-11-12