Debate contribution: Childcare Providers: Funding

Debate contribution by Mr Peter Martin on 21 January 2025.

MLA

Mr Peter Martin

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

21 January 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Childcare Providers: Funding

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4749594

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I commend the motion to the House, and, in my speech, I want to reflect on some of what has been achieved in childcare and preschool support over the past year and comment on what needs to happen in future. Before I do, I want to pick up on a point that the Member for South Down and who is on the opposite Benches made. I do not think that the debate is pointless. People out there think that this is an incredibly important issue and that it is certainly worth spending some time on. The debate is really important, and it has been respectful so far. I am a parent who uses childcare, and we need childcare for our daily life. I want to see speedy progress on the issue. Furthermore, I recognise that there are plenty of people who are watching the debate who are reliant on childcare for some of the reasons that have been cited. Our DUP Education Minister, Paul Givan, has delivered significant progress in this area over the past 11 months, and I want to pick up on a couple of those measures. It has been mentioned that, under the Northern Ireland childcare subsidy scheme, the parents of 14,000 children are receiving a 15% reduction in their childcare bills. That is money that is going back into those parents' pockets to use for something else. It is perhaps worth touching on the individual nature of what that actually means. In my constituency, over 890 families have benefited from the scheme and have saved a quarter of a million pounds. Those are real families, living real lives, who are benefiting from something that the Minister of Education has brought in. As has been mentioned, the Minister has initiated, to my knowledge, the single largest expansion in preschool education in the history of Stormont, resulting in an additional 2,500 children now getting full-time places. That is significant, but it is not about patting ourselves on the back; it is about recognising that progress has been made. Some people in the Chamber may perhaps not want to admit that progress has been made, but it has. The Minister has invested £7·6 million in early years programmes. We know the names of those early intervention programmes — Sure Start, Pathway and Toybox — and we hear plenty about them in the Chamber. The DUP is delivering on those programmes and supporting and expanding them.

I thank the Member for Strangford for his question. I agree with him. This is something that we want to see moving forward, and no one would debate that. The Member made the point about the time that we are using in the Chamber and so forth and whether that has been negative. I would reflect that the Member for Foyle was, possibly, rather negative in her comments, and I will come to those later. I agree with the Member that we all want to see good progress on this measure.

I counsel those who say that delivery is not fast enough or wide enough against such claims. To make this breakthrough, three key criteria are required: funding — Members mentioned that funding has already been provided; human resources; and capital. The sector gets that, but I am not sure that every politician in here understands it, so I have a very simple example. As parents, we got 12·5 hours in a local Presbyterian church hall. For that preschool to uplift to 22·5 hours, it needs those premises to be free and staff to work the extra hours. If the premises are not available and they are asked to provide additional hours, new premises must be found. Also, the staff must be willing to work the afternoon session or that extra time. Some politicians believe that change can happen with a simple click of a finger, but that is not the case. We are always best to be open and honest with people about where we are and how we are progressing. I am fully assured that the Education Minister has done all that he could with the funding that has been mentioned, and it is disingenuous, I think, for anyone to claim otherwise. I turn to the comments from the Member for Foyle. I do not mud-sling in the Chamber

or, for that matter, pat people on the back. She listed a number of Nordic countries. I remind her that those countries have extremely high tax rates not just for wealthy families but for middle-income families. I further say to her that the Executive do not have the vires to increase tax. The final piece of the jigsaw is a scoping exercise, as referenced by various Members, and the Minister for the Economy is tasked with carrying that out. The minutes of a meeting of the all-party group (APG) on early education and childcare in September state:

"The Department for the Economy is leading a scoping exercise, with support from the Department of Health and Invest NI, engaging with the sector to understand the issues ... It is hoped this will be complete by ... 2024."

Obviously, we know that it is not complete, and the aim is now to complete by March 2025. My hope is that the Economy Minister will deliver that as soon as possible. I am sure that he realises that it is a mission-critical element.

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

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:47 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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