Member's statement: Childcare: Costs

Member's statement by Ms Sinéad McLaughlin on 22 September 2026.

MLA: Ms Sinéad McLaughlin
Party at the time: Social Democratic and Labour Party
Date: 22 September 2026
Type: Member's statement
Business: Members' Statements
Heading: Childcare: Costs
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5739095

Text

I raise the issue of the continuing pressure facing parents, providers and workers across our childcare sector. At the DUP conference at the weekend, Gavin Robinson pointed to childcare as one of that party's biggest successes in government. He said that, because of the investment delivered by the Education Minister, mothers and fathers have been able to go back to work and families have more money left at the end of the month. That is not what I hear from families across this place. Yes, the childcare subsidy scheme is a welcome support — nobody disputes that — but childcare costs continue to rise. In April 2024, when we got back, parents were paying £61·50 a day for childcare; today, they pay close to £75 a day. That is an increase of 22% over the past two years. That is not a big success of government; it is a failure of government. For a family needing childcare five days a week, that is an enormous amount simply to allow both parents to go to work. We are supposed to be further ahead by now. The early learning and childcare strategy committed to increasing the childcare subsidy scheme from 15% to 20% from April of this year. We are in September, and that increase has still not happened. Therefore, we need to be careful about claiming victory on childcare. I still speak to mothers who are deciding whether they can afford to go back to work after having a child and to parents who are reducing their hours because the cost of childcare means that working does not make financial sense. Providers are struggling too. Their costs are also going up with the cost of living. Small providers find it increasingly difficult to make the numbers add up, and we continue to lose experienced childcare workers because they earn much more elsewhere and there are not enough opportunities to progress. That is not a sustainable childcare system by any stretch of anybody's imagination. The SDLP has consistently argued that we need to be much more ambitious. We have set out our childcare guarantee on how we could halve childcare costs by 2030 and ensure that no family is expected to pay more than they can reasonably afford. It cannot be just about reducing bills for parents. We also need to properly fund providers and build a childcare workforce in which people can earn a decent wage, develop their skills and see a future for themselves. Childcare is economic infrastructure, and it affects the entire economy. I welcome the progress that has been made, but the Minister needs to produce a real childcare strategy. What we have is not a childcare strategy; it is not what was promised. Parents pay more today than when the institutions came back. That is a failure across government.

472 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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