Childcare system ‘just broken, it's so sad’, says Cork pre-school owner

Cork early years education providers have given a lukewarm reception to Taoiseach Simon Harris’s claim that publicly-funded affordable childcare will be a “key priority” for Fine Gael in the next government.

Mr Harris told reporters at a Fine Gael parliamentary party think-in at Tullamore yesterday that he believed Ireland’s model of childcare and early years childhood education needed to be in the public space and “more closely linked to our education system”.

Promising a consultation process with parents and childcare providers, Mr Harris said he was “very proud” of the Government steps to reduce the cost of childcare and increase subsidies, but added that there was “more work to be done” around available places.

“There’s too many parents that say to me: ‘Yes, it’s good that you’ve reduced the cost, but I want to know what you’re going to do to increase the places’,” Mr Harris said.

Scepticism

Rowena Fisher, owner of Phyl’s Pre-School outside Coachford, which caters for 30 children, expressed scepticism at the proposed Fine Gael intervention.

“I just don’t see how this is supposed to work. These are our private businesses that we’ve put our blood, sweat, and tears into over the years,” Ms Fisher said.

She said possible State subvention might help, but it was “very late in the day” for many providers.

“The system is just broken, it’s so sad, the amount of high-quality services that are closing down every day due to lack of funding, we just can’t make ends meet,” she said.

“Nobody has been listening to us all along, we feel totally undervalued, and our staff deserve so much better. I know I should close down, I’m not making any money, but at the end of the day, I’m so loyal to our families.”

Susan Murphy is the owner of the Spraoi Pre-School in Ballincollig, which caters for 19 children and has a waiting list of 60. She said early years educators needed to recognised as teachers. “We’re early educators, we’re not childminders,” she said.

Recognised

“We have to be valued as educators, lots of us went back and did degrees, we’re a graduate-led sector and we need to be paid accordingly, we need to be paid during the summer, we need to be recognised the same as primary schoolteachers.

“I have to sign on every summer, and people who did the same degree as me and went on to become teachers and [special needs assistants] get paid during the summer,” Ms Murphy said.

Ms Murphy said that any money she earned last year in her pre-school “went straight back out in wages”.

Closures

Mick Barry, Solidarity-People Before Profit TD for Cork North Central, said what the country needed was a free, publicly-owned, not-for-profit childcare system, and not one designed for profit, and he instanced the recent closures of two Cork providers.

“The Taoiseach’s proposal seems to fall far short of that,” he said.

“While I’m at it, I’d also say that flowery promises aren’t much use to parents on the northside of the city who face an immediate here-and-now crisis after the closures of Before 5 and New Horizons.”

Fianna Fáil councillor for the Cork City north-west ward Tony Fitzgerald said that he would be cautiously welcoming of the Taoiseach’s proposals, but would need to see details.