Government ignores childcare crisis at its cost

`Something will be done in the Budget and it will be big," soothed Mary Hanafin last month at the launch of Childcare 2000. But the expected Government solution to the childcare crisis, a £40 per month increase in child benefit, is a joke.

The £10 a week (half the amount recommended by Childcare 2000) won't go far in Circle of Friends, the Republic's first purpose-built nursery chain which opens next month. It will offer top-quality care for £120 per week (and a few pounds more for babies), and parents will feel lucky to get it at the price.

£10 a week will also be of little use to economically disadvantaged women who want to get out to work, since childcare at that cost is simply not available. Irish parents and children, whatever their income, are all disadvantaged compared to European families, who receive the kind of financial support that Irish parents can only dream of. A full, living wage for stay-at-home parents; guaranteed part-time working; paid parental career breaks with job security and free creche facilities are realities in Europe.

This makes Irish parents the most exploited people in Europe, fuelling the economy by surviving on punishing two-career schedules, while also rearing young children without support from anybody. "We parents have been major players in creating the Celtic Tiger. What are we getting in return? Nothing!" storms Anne O'Donnell, of the National Women's Council of Ireland.

If we lived in Denmark, the government would be paying 80 per cent of our childcare costs. If we were to be treated like other European parents, our childcare costs would take no more than 8 per cent of our income, compared to a minimum of 20 per cent net income in the Republic.

In Finland, France and Germany we would also have the option of being full-time parents, paid by the government for the first three years of each of our children's lives. In the Republic we have a paltry parental leave of three months for children under five.

In the Republic, having children is an economic curse, unless you are wealthy. Tax breaks for childcare expenses would be a start.

This is a controversial issue within the Government, since some politicians believe tax breaks should not be targeted at middle-class "career women", who are popularly regarded as "well off". The thing is, parents paying huge childcare fees are not "well off" because they are creche- and mortgage-poor.

There is also a staffing crisis in childcare because for years nobody has thought the job important. In the past year, childcare salaries have risen by 50 per cent because demand outstrips supply. The Irish childcare industry will need enough workers to care for another 40,000 children by 2011, predicts Bernard Feeney of Goodbody Economic Consultants. The only solution, in his view, is for the Government to subsidise childcare wages.

Meanwhile, business interests are filling the gap left by a Government with no vision of childcare provision. The founder of Circle of Friends, Neil Browne (32), an accountant and father of a 22-month-old, is investing £300,000 in developing six purpose-built nurseries in the Dublin area and intends to develop 20 nurseries nationwide, many based in business parks.

In some cases Browne will develop nurseries on behalf of employers under legislation introduced last year, by which employers get capital allowances on investments in new nurseries, providing they have total control over the nursery's finances.

However, only the top richest 100 Irish companies can afford to avail of this Government tax break, says Browne, who will be offering the alternative of company places in Circle of Friends creches. To facilitate less affluent businesses, he is proposing that in the Budget the Government remove benefit-in-kind tax for nursery places provided to employees.

The ideas about what should be done are flying in from all quarters. The scandal is that the Government is making these decisions without consulting anyone. This secrecy is "disgraceful and outrageous", said Orla O'Connor, a policy analyst with the National Women's Council of Ireland who wrote the Childcare 2000 Campaign submission.

The crucial question is: whose interests will the Government serve at Budget time? "IBEC and industry are telling us that there is a crisis and the Government is listening. The economy needs this," said Mary Wallace, Minister of State at the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform.

The European ethos is based on enabling parents to look after their own young children. The trick in the Budget will be to do something substantial both for the parents who are paying an arm and a leg for childcare, and for those who wish they did not have to pay it at all.

The only sure winner is the Government, because the neglect of childcare has been so awful that any measure at all will be an improvement.