Ireland’s childcare sector is struggling, but is a State-led model the answer?

Karen Clince is CEO of Tigers Childcare, one of the biggest providers in the Irish market with 22 centres in Dublin, Cork, Kildare and Meath. She joins host Ciarán Hancock to explain the economics of running a childcare facility and give her view on proposals from the new Government to boost the sector.

And Laura Slattery of the Irish Times talks us through the findings of a survey from Dublin Chamber which shows how the childcare crisis is limiting the ability of companies to recruit and retain staff, especially women, with a fifth of all companies describing it as the primary barrier to doing so.

Plus, the World Economic Forum kicked off on Monday in the Swiss resort of Davos with many leading business and political leaders assembling to discuss the big global issues of the day.

It’s fair to say that Donald Trump’s return to the White House overshadowed all of that. The new US president hit the ground running, issuing more than 100 executive orders on his first day in office and pulling the US from the OECD’s global corporate tax deal.

That deal is very important to Ireland and could put us on a collision course with Trump’s new administration.

Irish Times Economics Correspondent Eoin Burke-Kennedy joins Ciarán on the line from Davos to go through the event’s main talking points thus far.

Produced by John Casey with JJ Vernon on sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.