State childcare success crucial to sustainability of pensions – Muscat

Childcare allows more mums to work, leaves €2 million in economy.

Mothers sending their children to free childcare services are starting work three months before mums who don’t, education minister Evarist Bartolo said today in a visit to the Qormi state childcare centre.

In the first nine months, from April to December 2014, the number of children in free childcare – a hallmark of the new Labour administration – was of over 3,000.

The number of mothers using childcare are entering the workplace three months before those mothers who don’t use childcare: contributing some €2 million to the economy.

“It’s one of our greatest successes in the last two years: it’s a social reform that has changed people’s mentality and sent more people into work, and will create better educational formation for our children,” Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said.

He was given a tour of the centre in Qormi where parents and children spent time together playing and socialising. “The invasion of gadgets like tablets have stunted certain personal and social capabilities to interact with adults… this interaction in the childcare centre aids the development of children.”

Muscat said the programme was self-financing, generating enough return to the economy from women returning to the workplace to justify the employment of more carers.

The prime minister linked up the need for free childcare to government’s strategy to finance pensions. “We’re not increasing pensionable age or national insurance [so] the only way to finance pensions is to put more people into work, and childcare plays an important part in this.”

Muscat said free childcare has saved €6,000 for working mums and dads, who would not have put their children in childcare if they were earning minimum wage. “We’ve made the service worthwhile for mums who now can go out and work… with more people paying tax and national insurance, we make pensions more sustainable. Free childcare is part of the entire economic strategy.”

Free childcare is not available to parents who do not declare their earnings for tax purposes.