Nursery World - Clarke's pledge to early years

Early years organisations have welcomed comments made by education secretary Charles Clarke about the early years sector. In his speech at last week's Labour Party conference in Bournemouth, Mr Clarke said there needed to be 'more resources for under-fives, where we know that early intervention can give the greatest benefit for any child'.

In his speech at last week's Labour Party conference in Bournemouth, Mr Clarke said there needed to be 'more resources for under-fives, where we know that early intervention can give the greatest benefit for any child'.

He added, 'And that is why my personal priority for the use of education resources has to be to strengthen and extend the provision we make for our children.'

Mr Clarke said that at present in England the Government 'invested' an average of about 1,800 per year in the education and care of every three-year-old child. However, it spent an average of 3,200 per year on every primary school-age child, 4,000 per year for every secondary school pupil, 4,300 per year for every young person at college after the age of 16 and 5,300 per year for every university student.

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