627. Deputy Seán Haughey asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the number of referrals into the Better Start Quality Development Service from city/county childcare committees, by CCC area, Tusla and self-referrals, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24964/24]

Better Start was established in 2014 by my Department, in association with the Department of Education, to deliver quality-related supports to early learning and care services and to support a cohesive approach to State-funded supports for quality across the early learning and care sector. Better Start is hosted by Pobal on behalf of my Department.

The Quality Development Service (QDS) forms one strand of Better Start activities. The QDS works with early learning and care settings in a mentoring capacity to promote and develop the quality of practice, as set out in Síolta, the National Quality Framework for Early Childhood Education, and Aistear, the Early Childhood Curriculum Framework.

The QDS offers a range of quality development options nationwide, including quality practice queries, focused quality practice development, and whole setting quality development for individual or multiple settings.

Requests for the service come directly to Better Start, principally from self-requests. All requests for the service are processed centrally. Early Years Specialists are allocated to the services on the basis of availability, skills and experience, as far as possible matching the service profile.

The table below shows the source of referrals since 2015 for the Better Start Quality Development Service: