Go To Work - Yeah, But Who’s Going To Mind The Baby?

I recently attended a Public Meeting on childcare hosted by the Fine Gael General Election Candidate in Dublin Fingal West. It was my intention going into this meeting to demonstrate about the current state of childcare in Ireland and my personal experience with finding care for my daughter.

My family and I are faced with a daunting problem: No childcare in my town or surrounding areas is available for my kid to attend. My partner, a childcare professional cannot re-enter the work force to fill the demand for staff but more importantly cannot provide the second income that is a necessity in North County Dublin.

I have sent hundreds of emails searching for something that can allow us to keep our heads above water financially and I was only met with waiting lists, facilities that are fully booked for the next two years and facilities that only take children once they reach the maximum profit age of two and a half years old. If we can’t return to a two income household, we may become homeless.

When I entered the community centre, I was handed a leaflet that gave the timeline of improvements in childcare since 2011. All of which are the introduction of some sort of subsidy to alleviate the costs of crèche fees in the private model propped up by Fine Gael with no mention of meeting the demand of childcare. Ten attendees entered the room and the meeting began.

Their general election candidate introduced themselves and gave a broad story of their own experience with finding their kids a place and struggling. Swiftly, the floor was opened to questions. The first sentence spoken by the attendees was how those who “never worked a day in their lives” get everything, they get free childcare and benefits etc. That set the tone for the evening. They explained their grievances with the current childcare scheme and how it impacts their career. I then took my turn to speak.

The world is now built on the system of a two working parent household, an abuse of the women’s right to work movement. Ireland is an excited growing country that is trying its best to look like a team player with our US and UK neighbours. Everyone now must work to achieve the dream of the little family, house and nice car, but the tools to allow us to achieve that dream are an afterthought. Only when we are in crisis mode, or an election is looming the ruling parties begin to listen to us and give the scraps.

The childcare sector is yet another victim of privatisation in Ireland. The model as it stands is to subsidise the costs of childcare on a means tested basis and that contribution is paid directly to the facility the child attends. The 2025 budget boasts that it will increase subsidies further, but with the much needed increase in minimum wage and rising rents plus insurance costs - private companies will shout they need to make a profit.

You can see how the budget is eaten up before it can have an effect on the pockets of parents.

It is a pseudo public model that does not involve the state actively providing childcare by owning properties and directly hiring staff. This is by design so that if needs be, the subsidies can be scrapped and any investment is easily liquefied. The private facilities are also privy to who can enter childcare and who cant.

Some only taking older kids to keep insurance costs down and others only taking children at the age were they can take advantage the maximum subsidy. If you only need part time? Forget it, full time children are more profitable.  Profit is at the forefront, not the welfare of children or allowing families to play the game of monopoly they’ve been forced into.

It’s also important to state that I would never expect or want a Fine Gael government to nationalise childcare and put the care of my children in their hands. Their track record when it comes to children is horrifying for lack of a better word. I wouldn’t trust the government that leaves children with additional needs without their right to education.

The government that have been promising a hospital my child will never get or the Taoiseach that promised vital scoliosis treatment to children seven years ago and have yet to be seen to. I wouldn’t trust my children with a party complicit in the atrocities committed by the Catholic Church.

In my speech I proposed the real solutions to the question of who’s going to mind the baby. We need radical and rapid development in the childcare sector, we need a fully public model, we need completely free childcare for at least the first two years of a child’s life and while this aggressive development takes place, allow a parent to care for their children at home for the first two years and receive the subsidies the private institutions would otherwise get.

The catastrophic state of childcare is also under represented. Some parents are lucky to work from home in their jobs and keep their kids with them. Something that is being taken away every year by companies. The actual demand for childcare is no where near as bad as it seems, it’s even worse. The response I was given to what is required was, a thank you and a promise they will consider and look into it.

Lastly, I’d like to reiterate that I do not have confidence in Fine Gael or Fianna Fail to provide a public model that works. During this public meeting I was accompanied by a member of Swords Stands With Palestine. A community activist group of ordinary people who are horrified by the the genocide being carried out on the Palestinian people by the Zionist state of Israel.

After we gave our words on the state of childcare in Ireland, we made it clear that the conversation we are having is a privilege because our children are alive and healthy. Meanwhile children in Gaza are being burned alive in medical tents and the ruling parties are not taking the necessary actions to stop this massacre.

The election candidate and their colleague tried their best to shut down our disruption of their meeting as they did not want to face or discuss their complicity in genocide. A common response to our protest is “this is not the time or place for that discussion”. I’ve yet to see a public meeting on Palestine by a ruling party. The time and place for them is never, so we must make it now.

If Fine Gael don’t care about children dying every day in Gaza. They do not care about your children and their needs. They do not care if their privatised neoliberal model doesn’t work. They do not care if you are forced into serious financial struggle or homelessness. They do not care to answer the question – Who’s going to mind the baby?