Children and families minister posts Twitter video in response to ratios row

As Nursery World has reported, Boris Johnson has proposed changing the rules to cut the number of staff that are required under the EYFS to care for children in nurseries, as a way of saving parents money on childcare, amid the cost of living crisis.

Yesterday evening, Quince tweeted, ‘The safety and quality of early years settings is of paramount importance to me and @educationgov.uk [sic]. I am looking at the quality and availability so that parents and taxpayers are getting the best value for money.’

He then posted a video of himself explaining the Government's rationale for the plans.

The transcript from the video is below:

‘You may have seen in the media that the Government, and me in particular, as the relevant minister, has been tasked by the prime minister to look at how we can ease the regulatory burden on the early years sector. And that means looking at regulation across the board, including things like ratios. And he has asked me to travel to some of our international comparison countries.

‘So, in the next 24 hours I’ll be travelling to the Netherlands, in the next few days and weeks I’ll be going to France and to Sweden, and closer to home visiting Scotland, as part of our United Kingdom, where they have a different regulatory structure, including different ratios.

‘So, why am I doing this? Why are we doing this as a government? Well, it’s all about ensuring that both for the taxpayer and for childcare users they’re receiving really good value for money. We spend about £3.5 billion as a department on the free eligibility, the 15 and 30 free hours, then there’s  the two-year-old disadvantage offer, which again is 15 hours, we have Tax-Free Childcare, we have universal credit that pays 85 per cent of childcare costs up to the cap. Making sure we have good value for money as part of the system is really important.

‘But I want to make one thing absolutely clear, because there’ve been some comments in the media. I have two young children and I have experience through them of both childminders and nursery settings and what I’m not going to do is compromise the quality or safety of early years settings up and down the country.

But it’s absolutely right that we look at some of our international comparators to see how they do it differently.

‘I’m going to keep a really open mind and one thing I can assure you is that I’m going to work really closely with the sector and with parents to make sure we get this right.’

'Ludicrous'

Sector organisations, early years settings, experts and parents have slammed the plans.

Yesterday the Early Years Alliance described the move as 'ludicrous', while the National Day Nurseries Association described it as 'a race to the bottom'.

June O’Sullivan, CEO of the London Early Years Foundation (LEYF), said the plan was 'an absolute insult to children, parents and the sector which is already struggling to survive.'

On Twitter, Sally Hogg, deputy CEO at the Parent Infant Foundation and lead for 1001 Days, said, 'Let's be clear: reducing required childcare ratios won't affect families equally. Providers whose families are on lower incomes will be more likely to utilise this, so it will be the youngest children in poorer communities whose care suffers. This is the opposite of levelling up.'

Emma-Lou @EmzMay74tweeted, 'Beyond ludicrous - not only dangerous and damning to providing high quality education, staff will be leaving in their droves. Recruitment is already in crisis.'

On Facebook, early years consultant Julia Manning-Morton said, 'This Government have been trying to find ways of doing this since they came to power and are now using the cost of living crisis as an excuse. Parents need to know that while such a measure may benefit their purse, it will be detrimental to the quality of provision and their child's well-being.