Call for investment in 'unregulated' childcare sector
More investment is needed for childcare services, opposition TDs said today as it emerged only 21 of 160 crèches and pre-schools in the west of Ireland were fully compliant with regulations.
Fine Gael’s children’s spokesman David Stanton called for reports on pre-school inspections by the Health Service Executive (HSE) to be published in full.
He described the revelation that checks in the HSE’s western area found almost 87% of premises in breach of some of the rules as worrying.
The information, released to the Irish Times under the Freedom of Information Act, covered annual inspections of services for 10 or more children in counties Galway, Roscommon and Mayo up to the end of September 2005.
It found crèches with failings such as inadequate sanitary facilities or fire procedures, no outdoor play area and toxic materials left within reach of children.
The pre-school childcare regulations cover areas such as fire precautions, staff and child records and ratios, insurance, sanitary conditions and general premises standards.
Mr Stanton said it was important to differentiate between dangerous infractions and relatively trivial ones.
“Therefore, it is vital that the inspection reports are published so that all parents are fully aware of the status of the facility in which they place their child.
“It is essential that the safety of children is paramount in all such facilities and parents must know that their child is safe, secure and happy,” he said.
“What is even more alarming is that we know that there is an unregulated childcare sector which is not open to inspection and which parents have to take on trust.
“That knowledge, coupled with recent reports of poor vetting of hotel baby-sitters, would suggest that far from making progress on child safety we are actually regressing,” Mr Stanton said.
He urged the Government to introduce incentives to open the unregulated sector up to inspection.
He also called for a contingency fund to help with the ongoing costs of community crèches, as well as increased development grants and training opportunities for childminders.
The Labour Party’s spokeswoman on children Senator Kathleen O’Meara blamed the failings on a lack of cash for pre-school running costs.
“Regulations are obviously essential, but the critical issue here is whether the funding needed to operate crèches to such a high level is being made available.
“The running costs of pre-schools are extremely high, and while the Government has spent on the capital programmes, there is still a significant difficulty around crèches being able to meet their day-to-day costs,” she said.
“Crèches are under-resourced, and more support of the childcare sector is desperately needed.”
Following the revelations Martina Murphy, spokeswoman for the National Children’s Nurseries Association, said the organisation recommended its members share inspection results with parents.
