Sinn Féin has called for an a significant childcare package to be provided for when Minister for Finance Brian Cowen unveils his Budget early next month.
The party has echoed a call for universal pre-school education for a minimum of 3.5 hours a day, five days a week in the year before a child starts school.
This policy was proposed earlier this week in a report on childcare from the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Justice. No one from Sinn Féin sat on that Committee.
The party also wants 12 months maternity leave, six months of which would be paid. Sinn Féin wants child benefit to be increased to €155.92 per month for the first child and second child and €192.85 for the third and subsequent children.
Extending the full medical card to all under-18s is another central part of the Sinn Féin childcare proposal.
A spokesman for the party said the proposals had not been independently costed. He said a rough estimate of the cost of the proposals was €1.5 billion per year.
This total was arrived at by using costings in a variety of different reports, including from the National Economic and Social Forum and the Combat Poverty Agency.