Speaking at a Labour conference in Kerry last night, the Tanaiste outlined her plans to extend the ECCE scheme, saying that this will “be a key plank in our election platform”.
Currently, the Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Scheme provides a free year of early childhood care and education for children of pre-school age.
This comes just days after Minister for Children, Fine Gael’s James Reilly, spoke to Newstalk regarding a task force of high-ranking civil servants who would be working on new approaches to the issue of childcare with full reports due before the Summer.
“At the moment we are spending just over a quarter of a billion euro. We want to be sure that the money we are spending currently is actually delivering what we are seeking.”
He maintained that the second year of the ECCE is guaranteed by 2020, which is not nearly as optimistic as Burton’s call for two years of free pre-school education available to every child before the end of the year.
“I want to ensure that before they start primary school every child has the right to two years of free pre-school”, she said last night.
The Tanaiste went on to outline her aims for the sale of the banks to benefit everyone in Irish society.
“On taking office, the banks became our problem to fix and we’re fixing them. It’s only right that the people share in any benefits that flow from selling them. In other words, a social dividend, a measure of fairness for the massive injustice inflicted on us all.”
Meanwhile at his own party conference, Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin maintained that Joan Burton and Labour were complicit in the bank guarantee saying that “she, after all, continued with the bank guarantee”.
He also announced that’s childcare is high on his party’s agenda, “we’ve already flagged childcare”, he said in his opening address.
It is starting to look like the issue of childcare is going to become a political playing field as the countdown to the 2016 election continues. Let’s hope that the very real needs of families across Ireland are actually addressed and that children are not just caught in mud-slinging inter-party crossfire.
