Nursery World - Dropping daycare obligation tops policy moves

The early years and childcare sector has been reacting to announcements by children's minister Sarah Teather that the Government will remove the requirement for children's centres in deprived areas to offer full daycare.

Speaking at the Daycare Trust conference, Ms Teather said, 'I want to limit the burdens on children's centres to make them responsive to local need. At the moment it doesn't make sense to make all children's centres offer full daycare in disadvantaged areas if there is not the take-up to make use of it.'

She also said that the Government intended to legislate to guarantee disadvantaged two-year-olds the free entitlement for 15 hours of early education 'on the statute book by 2013'.

During her keynote speech, Ms Teather said the Government wanted to prioritise child development and focus on early intervention, with funding for Sure Start through early intervention grants.

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