Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): We welcome from the Department Martin Tyrrell and Henry Johnston. Henry, I invite you to make opening remarks of up to five minutes.

Mr Henry Johnston (Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister): I will be quick and will hand over to Martin about halfway through.

I have taken over responsibility for the Bright Start childcare strategy in OFMDFM from Margaret Rose McNaughton. Officials last formally briefed the Committee on the Bright Start strategy back in March. However, more recently, in July and September, the strategy was discussed, when officials briefed the Committee on the legislative consent motion relating to the Childcare Payments Bill, which, as many of you know because you were there, went through yesterday. I am sure, as the Chair said, that is one of the things you will ask us about today.

As Committee members know, we launched the first phase of the Bright Start strategy in September last year, which included a list of 15 key first actions that were intended to address the main childcare priorities that had been identified during research and a public consultation. We will shortly update you on how those are progressing. We will also provide an update on work to progress the full Bright Start strategy. As the Committee will be aware, Ministers wish to launch the full version of the strategy next year.

I will now hand over to Martin, who will give a summary on where things are regarding the key first actions.

Dr Martin Tyrrell (Office of the First Minister and deputy First Minister): I will say a little bit about the paper that we sent you and go through some of the main items in it.

The paper covers three separate developments: the first phase of the Bright Start strategy and where we are with it; where we are with developing the full version of the Bright Start strategy; and the issue of affordability, which came up yesterday.

The first phase, as Henry said, was launched in September last year and comprised 15 key first actions to address the main priorities and childcare needs that were identified during consultation and research in 2012-13. Responsibility for those key first actions was assigned to various Departments. Key first actions 1, 2 and 5 were assigned to OFMDFM, and I will focus on them because they are the most ambitious of the key first actions and deal with school-age childcare, breakfast clubs and after-school clubs. Parents identified that as an area of under-provision in the consultation, saying they wanted to see more childcare services made available.

Key first actions 1, 2 and 5 aim to sustain or create between 5,000 and 7,000 school-age childcare places up to 2017. To make that happen, we have developed a grant scheme, which was launched in March of this year. The grant scheme is being delivered for us by the childcare partnerships, which are part of the Health and Social Care Board. The first call for projects ended on 16 May this year. That call drew 77 applications, of which 50 met the criteria. Those 50 are worth £1·9 million over a three-year period. They aim to sustain 1,165 places and create 326 new places.

A second call closed at the end of September, which has drawn 42 applications. The assessment of those applications begins next week. We will have a third call in 2015 and, prior to that, we will undertake preparatory work to develop high-quality projects and help people who have good project ideas to develop them prior to the formal call.

Other key first actions are progressing. I draw particular attention to the positive outcomes for the initiative on children with a disability, which has been taken forward by the Department of Health, Social Services and Public Safety; the work that DHSSPS is doing to make childcare information more readily available to parents through an enhanced information system, Family Support NI and a social media app; and the work that DEL is doing on workforce development.

We are taking forward the development of the full and final version of the strategy on a co-design basis, so we are working very closely with stakeholders to develop a consultation document. That work began before the summer, and it has included one-to-one meetings with the main childcare stakeholders and following those up with workshops to which the main childcare stakeholders were invited. We had a workshop at the start of October, and we have a workshop coming up again at the end of this month. All the information that we have gathered through those workshops will be taken into account as we develop the final version of a consultation document. We are hoping to launch the consultation after the November workshop with a view to meeting the target to launch the full, final Bright Start strategy in 2015.

I will turn to the affordability of childcare. The key issues that parents identified during the consultation process as inhibiting them from using childcare services were the availability and affordability of childcare. We are trying to address availability through, for example, our grant scheme, but that is also trying to address the issue of affordability, because the childcare places that we aim to provide through the grant scheme will be low-cost ones. In addition, we are promoting the financial assistance currently available to parents to help them meet the cost of childcare, and we look forward to the introduction of tax-free childcare, which we think will be an improvement on its predecessor, employer-supported childcare. We think that there will be more beneficiaries here under the new scheme, and there will be a greater amount of money delivered overall and at the individual level through the new scheme.

The reason why we believe that is because the new scheme is offering per-child assistance. So, the more children who are in registered childcare in a family, the more assistance that family will receive. It is not reliant on employers being participants in the scheme; it is independent of employers. Parents link directly into the scheme. They do not rely on their employers, and self-employed people can now access the scheme, which was not the case with its predecessor. We appreciate that employer-supported childcare is better for some people, and we welcome the fact that employer-supported childcare will remain open for the people who are currently on that scheme. That is essentially what is in the paper.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Martin and Henry, thank you very much indeed. I will not dwell on the change in the scheme at the moment, because the strategy is much broader than that. As you said, the most ambitious first actions are 1, 2 and 5. You say that, in the first call, all 77 applications have now been assessed and 50 have met the criteria. Is there any common reason for the failure of the other 27?

Dr Tyrrell: Cost is one, but I do not think that it was the dominant reason why projects failed. Sometimes, there were administrative errors in the form, for example, and people were asking for more capital or for capital expenditure that was not eligible. It was issues like that. There was no single, dominant reason why applications failed. All applicants who failed were given feedback on why they failed. All are encouraged to resubmit in the second call or in subsequent calls, and anybody who felt that their application was dealt with unfairly has the right of appeal.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): How often did you have to make a judgement about whether the applicant met your test of whether it was a social enterprise?

Dr Tyrrell: I was not personally involved in the assessment process, but I observed on some of the panels. I do not think that it came up that regularly. It was maybe once or twice.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): You will be aware that, in previous discussions, we had some concern about how easily defined your view of a social enterprise is. Can you update us on what you currently believe it to be?

Dr Tyrrell: We were very clear in the guidance that was issued to applicants that a social enterprise is an enterprise that invests its surplus. In the case of a school-age childcare setting, a social enterprise setting is one that invests its full surplus back into that setting.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): That is a new definition, because it was previously:

Dr Tyrrell: We wanted to clarify that because, when we checked with social economy people in Invest Northern Ireland, their view was that "principally" means that the setting or the business can invest in other social enterprises. For example, if you had a consortium of social enterprises and one of its facilities was making a surplus, it could distribute that surplus across a range of settings. We wanted to focus any surplus back into the setting that generated it.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): So "principally" remains in the definition.

Dr Tyrrell: Yes, it does.

Mr Johnston: It is just for clarification. It was always about not necessarily profit-making but not profit-taking. We were just refining that. I know that some facilities look at their childcare element as one of the elements that might generate funds for other social purposes within that setting.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Yes, computer courses could be funded.

It also refers to "primarily social objectives". Again, "primarily" is not objective. Have you had any difficulty applying that test?

Mr Johnston: Not with that further clarification.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): On the first call, the objective is to sustain or create the places, and you say that, in the first call, 326 new childcare places were created and 1,165 were sustained. So, that is a ratio of about 20% of the total being created and 80% being sustained. Is that what we should expect going forward?

Dr Tyrrell: With the first call, it is what we expect, but it will not be the same going forward. We did not expect to receive any new settings applying under the first call because the first call's closing date was just six weeks after the launch of the grant scheme. We were conscious in the first call that 40 school-age childcare settings had been funded by an OFMDFM scheme that was due to close on 30 September this year. We wanted to give all those 40 settings an opportunity to get an application in before their OFMDFM funding timed out on 30 September. That was one of the reasons for having so tight a call right at the start. We picked up all 40 from the OFMDFM-funded scheme in the 77 applications and an additional number of existing school-age childcare projects that were not funded by OFMDFM. So, those results are not surprising for the first call, but, for the third call in particular, we would expect to see brand new settings, not settings that are just not known to us or were not previously known to us.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Surely, from what you are saying, Martin, these results are surprising, in that 20% are for new places.

Dr Tyrrell: I suppose that it was a pleasant surprise that we got some new —

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Your primary objective in the first call was to protect the 40 organisations whose funding stream was going to close.

Dr Tyrrell: And any other projects whose funding was precarious.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): When I say "protect", I mean to make sure that there was —

Dr Tyrrell: I do not think all 40 were actually.

Mr Johnston: All 40 were not successful.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): But you were keen to make sure that they were not going down a cul-de-sac where the lights went out at the end of September. They had an opportunity for an alternative. OK.

Paragraph 4 states:

It might be just the language, but why would you not want to inform and animate the sector for the first and second calls?

Dr Tyrrell: We did that, and we got mainly existing providers on the second call from an initial analysis of the second call. We do not seem to be getting at the minute, except as expressions of interest, brand new providers coming forward with new childcare settings. That is what we want to encourage in 2015. This stands or falls on how many new providers we can encourage to set up. So, the promotional work will be continued, but it will be much more focused on prospective new providers. Previously, we had been promoting the scheme and encouraging people to apply. Now, we will be encouraging new people to apply and mentoring people who have good ideas.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): For your own lead objectives, you have one call processed. For the second, you have 42 applications, and you are processing those. You are about to go out to the third call. So, you seem to be hitting the ground.

When we look at those that belong to DARD and DRD, we see that DARD is currently considering options, and rural transport services that will support this initiative are being considered by DRD. With regard to DEL, the language has been "taking forward work", "seeking" to do things and "considering initiatives". Is it fair to say that you are much further down the road than your partner Departments?

Dr Tyrrell: I do not think so. A lot of the contribution from DEL will come after we have our third call. We are hoping to fund new settings. Those new settings will need to be staffed at the appropriate level. They will need qualified staff and managers. We do not want to displace existing provision, even in the sense of taking staff away from existing providers. So, DEL will be honing what it is doing in building up the workforce skills to focus on emerging projects that are coming through on the third call. So, I would not say that DEL is in any way underperforming on this issue. It is making a contribution to the key first actions.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): The final action is 15. In paragraph 10, you talk about how you are managing the strategy through a childcare strategy management forum, which meets every one to two months. Who populates that forum?

Dr Tyrrell: It is all the Departments that have a policy interest in childcare. So, it is all the Departments with a key first action.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Can you name those?

Dr Tyrrell: DHSSPS, OFMDFM, DSD, which does not have a key first action but has an interest in childcare, DRD, DARD and DEL. Childcare partnerships are also represented to give a stakeholder voice.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): It would be interesting to see the minutes and action plans and whether you use RAG indicators. Would it be possible for the Committee to have sight of those?

Dr Tyrrell: We can certainly follow that up.

Mr Johnston: My first meeting is on Friday.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): I have to ask this: what are the implications for the strategy, given the latest budgetary constraints?

Mr Johnston: Twelve million pounds was made available for OFMDFM, and we intend, in the fullness of time, to deliver with that £12 million. We allocated £1 million in June monitoring to DHSSPS to allow it to take forward the grants and administration in relation to the first wave, and we fully intend to support it at least at that level going forward. We need to look at what other Departments will be able to contribute based on their budget positions.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Can you define "fullness of time" for me, Henry?

Mr Johnston: We have a minimum commitment of £1 million. We want to invest more than that. The initial intention for childcare was to invest significantly more than that, but we will be reliant on monitoring rounds to secure additional funds over and above that.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): I might not be understanding this, but when we get to the end of this mandate, will you be confident that £12 million will have been spent?

Mr Johnston: No.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): How much can you say with confidence you think realistically can be spent?

Mr Johnston: We will need to see how much we spend next year. Up to this year, we will only have spent the commitments, which total about £2·7 million, and a further £1 million this year, so £3·7 million and whatever we spend next year. So, I would be very surprised if we achieved £12 million. The intention is to achieve perhaps £10 million going into the next mandate.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): OK. Thank you. I appreciate the candour.

Mr Spratt: Thank you for the presentation. The Chair raised a couple of points with you in relation to the 77 applications and the 55 that were accepted. You said that there was a right of appeal. Can you explain that right of appeal? How many of the 22 groups appealed, and how many of those appeals were successful?

Dr Tyrrell: From memory, there were two appeals. Those can be on the grounds that the decision was unreasonable or that there was maladministration. In both cases, the appeals were on the grounds that the decision was unreasonable. I do not know the outcomes of the appeals as yet.

Mr Spratt: It is important that we know that. I assume that each group is made aware that there is an appeal mechanism at the start.

Dr Tyrrell: Yes.

Mr Spratt: How independent is that appeals mechanism? Can you explain to us how it is done and who sits on it? I will be expecting you to tell me that it was done from outside the Department by another Department? Is that right?

Dr Tyrrell: The Department has no involvement in the selection process. It is carried out by the strategic funding panels that are organised by the childcare partnerships. Those are local. They are based in the Health and Social Care Board trust area. They comprise social partners relevant to the childcare sector.

Mr Spratt: What sort of a person would sit on a panel?

Dr Tyrrell: The actual panel that takes a decision is made up of groups such as PlayBoard and Early Years.

Mr Spratt: How many people would be on a panel of appeal?

Dr Tyrrell: There would be eight or nine people on a panel. There would also be somebody who would carry out basic analysis of the application and who would do a presentation on the aspects of the application.

Mr Spratt: It would be helpful if we had some indication as to who was on the panels and how they were formulated.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Can you take that as a request? You do not need that in writing.

Dr Tyrrell: Yes. The appeal is then heard by people who were not involved in the original decision. I believe that it would be staff from the childcare partnerships who were not involved in the original decision.

Mr Johnston: We will clarify that too.

Mr Spratt: If that can be done, it would be helpful to see the mechanism.

Yesterday's debate was about the childcare voucher scheme. I think that the Department and everybody have accepted that some people will be disadvantaged. There was some talk yesterday — I think that it was only a play with words — that there was going to be a scoping exercise. I think that the Department said that it would try to estimate the numbers. I suspect — tell me whether this is right or wrong — that, in terms of people getting the scheme, given that it is a scheme that comes under tax regulations at the end of the day — even the voucher scheme is paid for by Treasury — and given the confidentiality, which is similar to medical records, that there is an issue with that information being divulged and that there is an issue between HMRC and you or me as taxpayers. At the end of the day, it has to be made clear. Would the Department get numbers at the end of the day, or is it only if someone says, "Well, I have been seriously disadvantaged"? Is there a mechanism that can be put in place, given the commitment of the junior Minister yesterday, to allow the Department, in terms of the rest of the childcare strategy, to look at some mechanism to assist those who may be severely disadvantaged? How can we do that to get that information? How can we make folks in schemes aware that there is a possibility that they could get some additional help?

Dr Tyrrell: The first stage in our estimate will be to try to establish how many people are likely to be disadvantaged under the new scheme and get some idea of the amount by which they are disadvantaged.

Mr Spratt: If you do not have access to the names or the individuals, given the HMRC regulations, which are not dissimilar to medical regulations, how will you garner that information?

Mr Johnston: The primary, but not the exclusive, organisation in Northern Ireland is Employers for Childcare. It has been helpful in providing some information, but it does not have ready access to some of the information. Our understanding, based on the information it has provided us with, is that 1,000 employers are currently participating in the scheme, that 11,000 families are making use of that, and that the recruitment rate is roughly 1,000 a year. HMRC, using UK-wide figures, reckons that some 20% of families would be worse off, which is why we use the 200 families. We now need to find out what information sources we can access, bearing in mind that we would like to have known the ages of the children to see whether they were being disadvantaged because they were over 12. Again, we had some statistics in terms of childcare provision that showed that less than 7% of childcare providers make provision for children over 11. We really need to see whether there are any publicly available information sources — bearing it in mind that we will not get people's tax records — that will allow us to come up with a realistic estimate of how people will be disadvantaged. That is further complicated by the fact that there may be some families who would potentially be disadvantaged, but, if one parent is working and the other parent is not working but is in training or further education, they may be able to avail themselves of childcare provision. There might be 200 potentially, but slightly less than that might be impacted.

Mr Spratt: Are you saying to us that, in terms of the voucher scheme, the main information comes from the childcare people and that the Department will make moves to see how best that information can come back? That was one of the commitments —

Mr Johnston: It is.

Mr Spratt: — that was made in terms of trying to establish — I think that a number of members round the table have raised this — how many people are considerably disadvantaged.

I would accept that there will be more people advantaged by the new scheme — I think I said that yesterday — given the 116,000 people who are self-employed. Can you tell the Committee today that the Department is absolutely committed to looking at that and seeing how disadvantaged people can be put into —

Mr Johnston: We are absolutely committed to looking at that and at a range of information sources. All I am saying is that the information that Employers For Childcare has available does not have all of the stuff we need to do that realistic model. We will engage with it further, and we will be looking at other potential information sources, because one of my other concerns is people who may be members of national organisations who may be signed up with it but have a presence in Northern Ireland. We need to be sure that we are actually getting the full size of the cadre who could be disadvantaged, not just a segment of it.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): But the info you have, Henry, is interesting. You are saying that Employers for Childcare is saying that, at the moment, about 1,000 families a year sign up for the current scheme, and of that around 200, or 20% —

Mr Johnston: No, HMRC is saying about 20% nationally. If we apply the 20% figure to the —

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): So, say it is 20% here, but that excludes all those who will be able to avail themselves of the new scheme, so that 20% figure, if it is accurate, will shrink.

Mr Johnston: No. What I anticipate is that the 20% figure will shrink somewhat. I think, as Mr Spratt said —

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): There is only one scheme available at the moment, and HMRC is saying that, under the new scheme, if you cannot apply for the current one, around 20% will be less well off.

Mr Johnston: Yes.

Dr Tyrrell: What HMT is saying is that, of the people currently availing themselves of employer-supported childcare vouchers, 80% will be better off under the new scheme. So if we have 10,000 people here signed up for employer-supported childcare, we can expect 80% of them to migrate to the new scheme, leaving a core of 2,000. As their children age out of the scheme, that 2,000 will diminish, but Employers For Childcare say that there are 1,000 people who join the scheme per year. That will be 200 in years to come —

Mr Johnston: The 200 people who would have been better off —

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): They would have been better off —

Mr Johnston: Yes.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Yes, but as a percentage, then, if you take it that there will be more people who will be eligible for the new scheme, the 1,000 number may go to 1,500.

Mr Johnston: Yes.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Therefore that percentage — that number who are disadvantaged, as a percentage — shrinks.

Mr Johnston: Yes.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Because you get more people overall.

Mr Johnston: Yes.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): That is just what we are saying.

Ms McGahan: Thank you for your presentation. Going back to key point 6, on rural childcare, do you know what options are currently being considered by DARD? Also, DRD is considering rural transport initiatives. Are you able to provide any further information on that?

Dr Tyrrell: The original proposal in the key first action was that Bright Start would intervene and create 1,000 new childminder places serving the needs of rural communities, and that the DRD aspect of that would be to provide transport infrastructure to link those places to, for example, schools, if the children's parents were using childminders to look after them in the hours before and after school. That would be a transport system that would bring the children to and from school to the childminders. I believe that the analysis carried out by DARD has suggested that there is not a strong need for new childminder places in rural areas, and that it is looking at other options. For example, childminders are registered for six children, generally, but the average use is four. I think the average childminder has four children signed up rather than the full six. So it is looking at ways in which existing childminders can be encouraged to maximise the number of children that they are caring for — and the transport infrastructure part will stay.

Ms McGahan: So, the analysis from DARD was that there was no need for a new childminding —

Dr Tyrrell: Yes, for additional childminder places. That was its view.

Ms McGahan: OK. What did the consultation say?

Dr Tyrrell: The consultation that was carried out on the childcare strategy suggested that there was a strong need for childminding places in rural areas. However, there are issues of cost and existing provision. I think that DARD also looked at a previous childminding initiative, and the fate of the childminders who had been assisted under that initiative and how many were still childminding. I believe that 39% are no longer childminding.

Ms McGahan: From speaking to people in rural areas, I know that they are not really interested in childminding places. My understanding, following a question I asked the Minister, is that flexibility will be shown to the 1,000 places and that they could be transferred into social enterprise models. That is where the demand is.

Dr Tyrrell: Another option that is being looked at is childcare centres with childminders attached to them. Depending on need, some of the staff could function as childminders or could be absorbed back into the centre to look after children there. There is some flexibility.

Mr Johnston: That certainly came up at the event we held at the beginning of October. There was quite a focus on rural childcare, and one of the things that came out quite strongly around the tables was the idea of having those centres with, almost, satellite childminders. That would mean that, if a childminder's own children were sick and could not take other children, parents would have somewhere they could take their children. Those centres could also host bigger events, and a number of children could come together to do more socially intensive activities that would maybe prepare them a bit better for moving into a school setting.

Ms McGahan: I am also aware of someone, who lives in a rural area where there is particular need, who had difficulties gaining access to buildings. We do not have too many government-owned buildings in rural areas, and there is an issue with that. The buildings are not there to set up childcare facilities, and that needs to be looked at. If I go into Dungannon town, I can go to the council offices and get a database of vacant properties in the town where a childminding facility could be set up. That access is not there in rural areas, so that is a particular problem in those areas.

I have raised that issue with the Minister, but it should also feature in your thinking. We have a coordinating role in that matter. That may also be a reason why we are not getting new providers. The facilities — the buildings— are not there.

Mr D McIlveen: Martin, you gave a list of the bodies or stakeholders who were around the table when you were coordinating the project. Maybe I misheard. Is the Department of Education around the table?

Dr Tyrrell: I think that there are educational stakeholders from, for example, the Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education, similar bodies and perhaps education and library boards. I would need to check definitively the list of participants on those strategic funding panels.

Mr D McIlveen: OK. So, you think that the boards might be around the table?

Dr Tyrrell: Yes, from memory, but I would need to check definitively.

Mr D McIlveen: The reason that I ask that probably touches on Bronwyn's issue, as it is probably more of a rural issue than an urban one. What role does the Department have in the management and funding of places? We have well-known issues with some primary schools that are struggling to build their numbers — it is all viability and pupils at desks. They are providing breakfast clubs and childcare facilities almost at a loss, in the full knowledge that, if children have formed friendships and bonds from a preschool age at a main school building, the choice will inevitably be made for them to be enrolled at that school. Whilst, from a parental choice and a parental convenience point of view, I can see the merit in that, it is quite often to the disadvantage and cost of other childcare providers, whether they are community-based childcare facilities or even individuals who want to set up a childcare facility.

I am veering on to a line here where I will possibly sound a little bit more to the left ideologically than I am, but how will we ensure that either existing larger providers of childcare will not just gobble up all the money or, possibly worse still, that it will not ultimately be used as top-up funding for the education system, which obviously has its own budget? How can that be managed? What message can you give to the people who want to perhaps sustain a small rural childcare facility and may look at this and think, "We are finished once this comes in"?

Dr Tyrrell: One of the key selection criteria for any applicant to the grant scheme is that they have to show that they are not duplicating or displacing existing provision. They have to show that there is need. We looked at it and tried to map it. There are 890 super output areas in Northern Ireland, and 75% of those have no centre-based school-age childcare provision. So, in 75% of our super output areas, there is nothing to displace because there is nothing there already, and we are targeting that 75% in particular. That tends to be in rural areas and disadvantaged areas. An important aspect of the decision-making process is to establish that any applicant is not simply duplicating existing provision, and one of the advantages of using the childcare partnerships as a managing agent is the local knowledge that they can bring. Each of those funding panels is a local funding panel and can bring its local knowledge to bear on the decision-making process.

On the top-up issue, every project has to show that it is sustainable or is capable of becoming sustainable over a three-year period. We are not giving people subsidies here; we are giving people assistance to become sustainable, free-standing businesses that we can then step back from. We are trying to create a network of sustainable low-cost childcare providers. So, the sustainability issue should exclude people who are just looking for top-ups to keep going for a few years.

Mr D McIlveen: I am kind of arguing against myself here, but how do you balance sustainability against efficiency? Surely it would be much less expensive for me, as a parent, to drop my child to a breakfast club in a local school, albeit that it might be five miles down the road, if that is the school that the child is going to, as opposed to taking him or her to a facility half a mile away from my house for them to then be transported from that place down to the school when the main school day starts. How do you balance those things?

Dr Tyrrell: We do not exclude schools from applying. Schools can apply. If schools can meet the criteria, show that they are progressing towards sustainability and show need and have a strong application, they will get funded. We encourage that. We want to see 2,000 to 3,000 school-based places. In fact, schools are pretty key to this because they are strategically located throughout Northern Ireland. If we can get schools to buy into this, that will start to address the problem of accessibility and availability of childcare places, but they still need to show non-duplication, that they are meeting need and that they are progressing towards sustainability.

Mr Johnston: There are two ways that that could be done. Either the school is running the facility itself or the school can maybe make spare buildings, particularly if they have a shrinking role, available to a community provider or even to a private provider so that they are coterminous. It cuts down the anxiety of parents and people travelling distances between the childcare setting and the school setting, particularly for breakfast club wrap-around. That is one of the areas we will be looking at. Again, it is really about sweating the school estate a wee bit more.

Mr D McIlveen: I suppose that it would be advantageous to have the Department of Education around the table.

Dr Tyrrell: It participates in the management forum for the childcare strategy. I possibly did not mention it when I mentioned the Departments that are around the table, so I correct that: it is also part of our management forum. Sometimes, it is easier to say who is not part of our management forum.

Mr D McIlveen: OK. Thank you. That was very helpful.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Just on that point, gentlemen, key first action 1 is:

Your first roll-out has created or sustained 1,491 places. How many of those are in the top 25% of areas with the highest deprivation?

Dr Tyrrell: Forty-eight of the 50 successful applicants are serving disadvantaged communities. So, they are located in the top 25% of the most disadvantaged areas, or 30% or better of the parents using the service are from a disadvantaged area.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Can you give me a number out of the 1,491?

Dr Tyrrell: Of the places we are creating?

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Yes.

Dr Tyrrell: No, but we can tell you how many of the 1,165 are. Do you have that number, Henry?

Mr Johnston: Oddly, not off the top of my head. It must be the overwhelming majority, because 48 of the 50 are serving disadvantaged communities.

Mr Lyttle: The childcare budget for 2011-15 is £12 million: is that right?

Dr Tyrrell: That is the amount that was committed.

Mr Lyttle: How much of that has been spent?

Dr Tyrrell: About £2·7 million.

Mr Lyttle: OK, so there is a fair amount left.

One of the key principles and actions in the Bright Start strategy is informed parental choice. Action 7 is entitled, "Better Access to Information on Childcare and Related Financial Support", and has three sub-actions: improve the Family Support NI website, create an app and conduct a publicity campaign on childcare and financial assistance for childcare. Where is the Department in relation to those actions?

Dr Tyrrell: None of those actions sits with OFMDFM; they have been assigned to DHSSPS.

Mr Lyttle: OK, so where are the Executive in relation to those actions?

Dr Tyrrell: The enhancement of the Family Support Northern Ireland (FSNI) website is complete, the app was launched in the past couple of months and is available and the promotional campaign for unregistered childcare and financial assistance has not started. Within the grant scheme, we are promoting the financial assistance that is available, and we require all assisted settings to promote to the parents who are using their service the financial assistance that is available to them. That includes advising parents on which form of assistance is more appropriate for them and which one they should be applying for.

Mr Lyttle: That is only for those who have access to Bright Start.

Dr Tyrrell: The people who are being funded: the settings that have been grant-aided as a condition —

Mr Lyttle: That is a drop in the ocean when it comes to the number of families out there.

Dr Tyrrell: There are 50 assisted projects thus far, and that will move up to 291 eventually.

Mr Lyttle: The app is called, "Childcare & Family Support NI". I tried to find it today and was not able to. Could you check that it is functioning and give us some information on it? Apps are a good idea if they are working.

Dr Tyrrell: Yes.

Mr Lyttle: In terms of the publicity campaign, we touched on the fact that the UK financial assistance scheme, which is a childcare voucher scheme run by HMRC, will likely change in autumn 2015. My understanding is that there might be a bit of slippage in relation to that, so it will be late 2015, at the earliest, before that change happens.

Only £2·7 million of a £12 million budget spent and that organisations have been lobbying and proposing detailed publicity campaigns and have been detailing ideas on how to go about it, including television adverts, the use of Bounty packs for new parents etc. That has been costed at around £200,000, which is a small percentage of the money that has failed to be spent in the current budget. Given that the average savings for families who avail themselves of that childcare voucher scheme is around £1,000 a year, why has the publicity campaign not happened?

Dr Tyrrell: I am not aware of why it has not happened. I need to follow that up.

Mr Johnston: We need to follow that up to find out. HMRC is meant to be promoting the existing one on a UK-wide basis. We will find out what is happening with DHSSPS.

Mr Lyttle: A thread of the contribution yesterday was that it is a UK Government scheme, and so, "It's over to you, UK Government", but OFMDFM is responsible for children and young people and childcare. It has millions of pounds available to it to try to increase access to funds that are not even coming out of our block grant. The childcare voucher savings are coming from the UK Budget. Given that around 11,000 families are availing themselves of it and that there are estimates that maybe 200,000 families could avail themselves of it, it is scandalous that a wholesale campaign has not happened, given how little of that money has actually been spent. There is a real opportunity for OFMDFM to activate a wide-ranging publicity campaign as a matter of urgency to try to increase childcare voucher scheme uptake between now and late 2015. That would help to ensure that, if people were better off being on the childcare voucher scheme set-up, they would have signed up to it and would then have a choice between it and the new childcare payment scheme. OFMDFM should do something about that. Whether it is OFMDFM or Health, a significant amount of money is available to try to action that. It is not rocket science; it is a publicity campaign that clear suggestions have been made for. Maybe you could provide the Committee with an update in relation to that.

Mr Johnston: Will do.

Ms Fearon: This would have probably linked in better with your point earlier around the 48 applications from deprived areas. What was used to measure deprivation? Was it neighbourhood renewal areas?

Dr Tyrrell: We went down to super output areas. We used income deprivation affecting children; the proportion of children under the age of 16 in low-income households. The top 25% in terms of disadvantage ranges from, I think, 96% in the most disadvantaged super output area to 37% in the least disadvantaged of the top 25%.

Ms Fearon: Do you have a geographical spread of the successful applications, or, maybe more interestingly, the non-successful applications?

Dr Tyrrell: We could certainly provide that.

Ms Fearon: Did any of the projects receive full capital or revenue funding, or did they all receive part?

Dr Tyrrell: The maximum that any setting can receive under the grant scheme is equivalent to 25% of their running costs, which are calculated as their operating costs minus their fee income. The grant scheme will fund the shortfall up to an amount equivalent to 25% of their running costs.

Mr Johnston: Or £70 per child.

Ms Fearon: Finally, I am not sure whether the fault lies with the Department or the childcare partnerships, but there were issues in my area — from speaking to people in other constituencies, I know that it was the same — because of serious delays in letters of offer going out. Some people went into September and ended up losing places as a result of not having received a letter of offer in time. Has that been resolved across the board?

Mr Johnston: No.

Dr Tyrrell: We are in the process of resolving that. We are disappointed that the letters of offer were not issued in September. That was our intention.

Ms Fearon: Was that the fault of the Department or the childcare partnerships or both?

Mr Johnston: We are trying to resolve that with DHSSPS. I think that there was some concern, until the Budget was known, about entering into a commitment for future years. We transferred £1 million to it, but I think that it wanted assurances. We have provided it with assurances that the money will be available next year and the year after. We hope that those assurances will be sufficient and that it will issue the letters.

Ms Fearon: OK.

Mr Johnston: Which trust area do you fall into?

Ms Fearon: The Southern Trust.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): I have two, I hope, quickies to finish with, Henry. Going back again to the first call, 326 new places were created. Are those actually now in existence?

Mr Johnston: No.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Timescale?

Mr Johnston: They will not be created until the letters of offer are issued. We anticipate that, once those letters of offer are issued, they will be provided very quickly.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Timescale for the letters of offer?

Dr Tyrrell: We hope that it will be within a week or two weeks.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): OK. Finally, I think that the document is silent on the important issue of flexibility of opening hours, which is something that parents look to. Is the strategy addressing that?

Dr Tyrrell: The strategy will address the issue of flexible childcare to meet the needs of people working atypical patterns.

Mr Johnston: I will finish off on a point that you raised about geographic coverage. One of the trust areas, the South Eastern Trust area, is not that great on applications.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Noted.

Mr Johnston: We will want to look at that area to find out why it has fallen behind other areas and encourage it.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): I am happy to work with you on that.

Mr Lyttle: Is it possible to get details of the successful projects to date?

Mr Johnston: Yes, we have agreed to do that and to map it.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): So, you have agreed to provide the details of the successful ones. You have agreed to provide, at Jimmy's request, details about the appeals process and who does it.

Mr Johnston: And about the panel.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): You have agreed to provide Chris with details on the advertising and me with the minutes and action plans of the childcare strategy management forum. Are you going to take that away so that we can get an answer?

Mr Johnston: Yes.

Ms Fearon: You mentioned the South Eastern Trust. Was it poor on applications or successful applications?

Mr Johnston: It was both.

Dr Tyrrell: There were relatively few applications and relatively few successful applications.

The Chairperson (Mr Nesbitt): Martin and Henry, thank you both very much indeed.