This week we continue our Stretched series by looking at the cost of childcare in Ireland.
Parents all over the country are paying huge sums of money for creches as well as after-school and summer childcare.
Jenny Doyle, a mother of one, moved to Newbridge from Dublin two years ago. She has seen a huge difference there in childcare costs for her son: "The creche fees in Dublin were about €300 more than what we're currently paying. We both work full-time so we have to put our child into creche."
"Creche is great for his social skills and development and he's excelling in all areas. The staff are brilliant - they just don't get paid enough so they have to increase fees unfortunately."
Jenny says that if she had more than one child, she'd have to stay at home.
Dr. Sheila Garrity, lecturer in early childhood studies at NUIG, feels Jenny's situation is very typical of many families in Ireland now.
"The basic reason for the high cost of childcare is because the state is investing so little in the early years of a family's life. A family who can't afford to have a second child is actually an economic issue for the state."
She contrasts Ireland with Denmark, a country of a similar size and population, which "invests four times what we do in early childhood years."
Teresa Heeney of Early Childhood Ireland points out that our childcare costs are higher than anywhere else in Europe: "Irish families are paying 35% of their average income on childcare. This is because historically we have very low levels of investment. In some way we think that early years is a private, family issue - we don't see it as a societal issue."
Childcare worker Deborah Reynolds spoke to us about the difficulties she and others in her profession face: "There's a lot of people on minimum wage and they're struggling. I'm currently on the dole because we're not open during the summer."
Here are some of the comments from our listeners on their childcare costs:
- 'My creche charges when they are closed, even at Christmas - nobody books their kids in on a Monday because there are so many bank holidays - that you still have to pay for when they are shut - it's a joke.'
- 'I asked my creche about the affordable childcare scheme that is coming out in September and the creche owner told me that they knew nothing about it. When I queried this with the local childcare committee they told me it was up to the owner's discretion whether they signed up for it. I think it's scandalous that a scheme that is out there to help parents is at the mercy of greedy creche owners.'
- 'In the same boat as that lady with 2 in childcare costing €330 a week. On top of €1,200 a month mortgage, it's suffocating. In Australia they give tax relief for people in that position. Money will go back into economy anyway.'
- '€860 per week full time in Navan for one kid. Moved daughter now to Athboy and reduced to 3 days. The wife had to perform some miracles to get her schedule bent around this. And my brother in Germany is complaining about the €300 he is paying full time for an alternative creche.'
- 'Myself and my partner are in our mid-30s and work full time and have two young children preschool age. We pay almost €2000 for creche per month but due to changes in opening hours we have to change to a childminder. We are doing it officially and paying PRSI so it will be a minimum of €2,400 per month. So our childcare and mortgage exceed €4,000 per month. My basic pay doesn't cover this when all the usual bills are added in. If I work an overtime shift I only get 41 cent take home for every euro. I know we are lucky to have careers and a healthy family but there surely could be room for some sort of tax break for the many people like us.'
- 'We live in Dublin and find the cost of childcare crippling. We have combined gross salaries of over €100,000 yet after mortgage, creche fees and bills, we struggle to have enough to go out for social activities like going out for dinner once a month. Our lives are far from extravagant, we both work full time and long hours but despite decent incomes we have quite a poor quality of life. We recently decided to move to the country and a big driver for this is the extortionate childcare fees in Dublin.'
- 'I'm an Italian citizen living in Ireland for the past 14 years, 3 kids (10 months, 5 years and 9 years), we had to opt for an au pair as childcare was literally eating us alive. In Italy childcare is public and basically free, you have state creches in each village or city and you only pay a small amount monthly for food. We are lucky we have a spare room for the au pair, otherwise I would have to leave my permanent job to look after the kids. It's a disgrace and even more worrying, politicians are doing nothing about it.'
