DfE must address the serious concerns about delivering free childcare
3 min read
Labour MP and Public Accounts Committee member Karin Smyth has laid out the problematic areas that need to be highlighted ahead of the increased entitlement of free childcare.
The government’s plans to increase entitlement to free childcare for working families with three- and four-year-olds from 15 to 30 hours a week from September 2017 are most welcome.
But through my work on the Public Accounts Committee I’m aware of genuine concerns about the Department for Education’s ability to deliver it. Our report on entitlement to free early years education and childcare outlines the risks. In calling this debate I want to highlight some areas about which I and my Bristol South constituents have specific concerns. They fall into four main areas.
First is workforce planning. As a former governor of a nursery and children’s centre I recognise its importance. But the Committee’s inquiry found the DfE doesn’t have robust plans to ensure there are enough qualified early years staff to deliver the additional hours pledge. The department doesn’t even have a workforce plan for the early years sector. This is worrying, and raises serious questions about the pledge-making process, since the ability to deliver appears not to have been thoroughly assessed.
I hope this debate will help shed light on Ministers’ plans to address the challenge of ensuring there are enough people with the right skills in the years ahead.
Second is the high cost of childcare, a key reason why the ‘30 hours free’ offer is so important to many working families. I know from my own Bristol South constituency that fees provide a real challenge, with some currently being informed of significant fee increases of up to 30 per cent being imposed by their local private nursery.
Indeed the Committee found some providers only offer free entitlement if parents also pay for additional hours: a form of reverse means-testing. The charity Gingerbread told us of calls from parents whose providers put conditions on the entitlement. This contravenes the DfE’s own statutory guidance.
Third, Ministers need to measure the impact of the offer to ensure the taxpayer is getting value for money. I was concerned the DfE has no routine data to assess the impact of its investment in the early years. This must be remedied since it needs to play a key role in helping shape future policy. If the department does not know what works well, and how to get the best bang for its buck, taxpayers will be left short-changed.
Finally, although Bristol residents are well served by a searchable database of local providers, nationally there are unacceptable local variations in information available to parents. The Committee found only a third of parents are even aware of the service and the department must improve the consistency and quality of information for parents. If an offer is there, but most of those who are eligible don’t know about, or how to access it, then its value is diluted, to say the least.
I hope that as a result of the debate Ministers will outline their plans to address these wide-ranging concerns so we can move forward on delivering this vital additional entitlement.
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