Nutbrown slams 'More Great Childcare' plans

Professor Nutbrown, who led the much-praised government-commissioned review of early education and childcare qualifications published last June, says that as she read beyond the headlines of the government proposals, ‘I realised that most of my recommendations had, in effect, been rejected.

‘Whilst I felt that my recommendations taken together would enhance quality, I am not at all convinced that accepting just five, and tinkering with many others, will achieve the outcomes for children and for their professional practitioners that many had hoped for.’

Professor Nutbrown, speaking to Nursery World, said that she had wanted to take time to consider how the government had responded to her review and express clearly her views.

‘I worry about the most vulnerable children and families,’ she said. ‘It’s important to make the arguments and to do what we can to prevent policy from deconstructing quality.’

Professor Nutbrown is particularly critical of the plans to introduce non-QTS early years teachers, to relax ratios, and not to require childminders to hold formal qualifications.

Early years teachers

Early years teachers, she argues, ‘will not have the same status as teachers of children over five years of age. The hoped-for parity with primary and secondary school teachers will not be realised.’

If Early Years Professionals are simply to be renamed, says Professor Nutbrown, ‘is this not insulting and misleading?’

‘So how will the early years teacher feel when told that she or he cannot teach children in Year 1 because they are not sufficiently qualified to do so?...And why is the title ‘teacher’ being used to mean something quite different from the commonly understood, established and accepted meaning? This reaches deep into the heart of the culture and nomenclature of UK practice.

‘Since the first introduction of EYPS, those who worked hard to obtain that status have been questioning the lack of parity with QTS. In my review, I sought to end the disparity…it seems that now one form of inequality is to be replaced with another. Yet again, those who work with young children are offered a lesser status, but a title that makes them appear to have the same role and status.’

On plans to change staff:child ratios, Professor Nutbrown comments, ‘If the small children whose early years settings could be affected understood that was going on, I think they too would be worried.

‘Trading staff:child ratios for higher qualified staff is nonsense. Watering down ratios will threaten quality. There is nothing relaxing about the proposal to ‘relax’ ratios. It will lead to stress – for children, for parents, for early years practitioners. Who will suffer most? The youngest, most vulnerable children’

Professor Nutbrown says that the positive impact of raising the quality of level 3 qualifications will be weakened if ratios are weakened. She adds that although her review said that ratios for three- to five-year-olds with properly qualified teachers could be looked at, she had stressed that those for younger children should not be tampered with.

Childminders

With childminders, Professor Nutbrown says that her recommendations ‘appear to have fallen on stony ground. There is no planned requirement for childminders to hold any formal qualifications even though the number of children they can work with seems set to rise. What reasonable justification is there for treating part of the workforce – also within the EYFS – so differently from the rest?’

‘So yet again, an opportunity truly to value the thousands of women and small number of men who dedicate energy, intellect and commitment to providing the best they can for our youngest children is to be dissipated and – plus ca change – they are to content themselves with something less than their colleagues working with older children.’

DfE response

A Department for Education spokesperson said, 'Professor Nutbrown’s review provided a valuable contribution to the development of our proposals for early education and childcare. We have taken forward several of her important recommendations, but we recognise that reforms and improvement need to go much further if we are to give parents a proper choice of high quality childcare and early education.

'All the evidence shows that quality and safety are linked to high quality staff. Our reforms mean that only high quality providers will be able to have this additional flexibility. Our preliminary work suggests providers will be able to attract quality staff: using the new ratios could enable nurseries to pay staff up to £3,000 more per year.

'Our reforms will bring us into line with countries like France and Denmark.'

• See the full response from Professor Nutbrown attached (right).