Nurseries throughout the UK are facing an anxious wait for details of how cuts of up to 25 per cent to each government department will play out in the childcare sector.
While nurseries were left largely unscathed by the first round of spending cuts, which took place in May, many are bracing themselves for pain over the forthcoming Comprehensive Spending Review, due to be published on 20 October.
This will set spending limits for every government department from 2011 up until 2015.
While the coalition Government has confirmed it will continue with some Labour policies and initiatives, including the statutory implementation of the Early Years Single Funding Formula and the extension to the free entitlement, question marks remain over projects such as the Quality and Access grant, which was set up by the previous government to help settings improve their buildings, outdoor areas, ICT and facilities for disabled children. The three-year-funding scheme ends in March 2011, but there are fears that unspent money will be withdrawn (news, Nursery World, 22 July).
Other settings are fearful over the future of the Graduate Leader Fund (GLF), set up to help practitioners to achieve Early Years Professional (EYP) status. While the last government agreed in principle to make funding available until 2015 to achieve its aim of having an EYP in every full daycare setting, no funding has yet been allocated to the Graduate Leader Fund programme beyond April 2011. Recent research revealed that only one in five settings in the PVI sector employs an EYP (news, 12 August).
Some nurseries have taken the bull by the horns and made suggestions on the Government's spending challenge website about how the coalition could both save money and help the childcare sector. Jackie Howse, who runs Little Robins Day Nursery, Birmingham, has urged the Government to pay tax credits for childcare directly to providers rather than parents (news, 21 July), a move which she says would reduce tax benefit fraud. Other owners and managers are campaigning for nurseries to be able to register as zero-rated for VAT ahead of the increase in VAT from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent in January 2011, an increase they say will have to be passed on to parents, in the form of higher fees.
THE WAY AHEAD
Alan Bentley, chairman of the Childcare Corporation
I would like the Comprehensive Spending Review to recognise that the amount of money that settings receive for the free entitlement doesn't come close to the cost of providing the free place. While I don't expect to see the level of funding increased, we now have the added problem of transparency. The Childcare Corporation operates settings in up to 12 counties and the way local authorities define flexibility with regards to the free entitlement is completely subjective. What we need is some sort of sensible approach that takes into consideration that the childcare sector is largely driven by sessions. Most settings can't offer parents exactly the hours that they want because it is impossible to run a business like that.
We should be able to offer parents sessions, such as a morning or afternoon slot, which of course would have an added benefit of reducing both staff costs and wastage. This is something that I would love the Government to consider.
I also believe that the Government needs to think more about how it helps the poor. The whole recession emphasises the need to provide resources where they are needed the most. It doesn't make sense that people who earn over £100,000 a year receive free nursery places. I see no reason why benefits like childcare vouchers ever needed to offer top rate tax relief. I would prefer these things to be means-tested, with the most support given to those on lower incomes.
Carol Jenkins, managing director, Places for Children
Staff at P
laces for Children tell me that because there is uncertainty within local authorities about the continuation of the funding for the Graduate Leader Fund, they are worried they will not be able to afford to complete their courses.
This is also a concern for me and many other providers. My team think there should be a greater focus on funding specific training for specific roles and continuing professional development. The review should investigate the possibility of developing a cost-effective framework for professional qualifications, skills and continuing professional development for the childcare workforce. A cost-effective vehicle for delivering this level of training will be vital to achieving high-quality childcare.
Childcare plays a key role in supporting economic recovery by enabling working parents to continue working. I would like the Government to view the diverse range of childcare providers as key partners in helping to deliver this vision. We need the Government to enable and actively encourage effective partnership working between the PVI sector and the maintained sector. Childcare providers are able to provide off-site and on-site solutions to schools and other maintained settings.
It would serve us well for the spending review to address the size, number and effectiveness of many non-governmental agencies such as quangos and to review local authority spending to ensure there is clear monitoring of the impact of the spending, tracking of progress and the elimination of wasteful projects.
Karen Walker, then director of Children's Place nurseries (now with London Early Years Foundation)
I hope the Review will acknowledge the importance of the GLF and the funding that settings get from the CWDC. Without this funding, nurseries cannot continue to move forward and raise standards at their settings. Some of our Children's Place staff are half-way through their degree: if the plug is suddenly pulled on funding, we will not have the means to pay for them to continue. Another big concern for me is that they are going to try to move the goalposts on quality via the review of the EYFS. The EYFS was a big change for a lot of people and did alter how we work with children in our settings, but I think that it has changed our practice for the better. It has helped settings to move to a new level. The Government says it is looking at simplifying the framework, but how do you simplify it? All of its key areas are vital.
I hope they will not try to dilute the requirement for graduate-led settings. My concern is that the Government has not really grasped the importance of having a graduate-led workforce. We don't want to go back to the idea that we are basically just babysitters and I hope the Government does not decide to focus on care at the expense of early education. The early years are the most formative years of a child's life, after all.
Peter Churchley, director of Caring Daycare
My hope is that the Comprehensive Spending Review will recognise that proper funding for the free entitlement is one of the most important things for children. If the free entitlement was properly funded, it would make high-quality childcare more accessible and enable settings to be more self-sufficient in providing training for employees. At the moment, the free sessions are supplemented by the Graduate Leader Fund (GLF), but if the free entitlement was funded more realistically we could then pay for more staff training. This would reduce the number of different funding streams and so have the added benefit of simplification.
I am reasonably happy with our local authority's single funding formula arrangements, although we are having to change our pricing arrangements and fee structures from September. The number of maintained nurseries in Surrey is small, so it will not really change the playing-field.
With regards to the Early Years Capital Grant, I am very realistic that we have had access to quality improvement grants over the past few years and we made full use of them, knowing that that level of funding was unsustainable. We made the most of this funding and treated it as a windfall and we are moving on from that now.
I am disappointed the new code of practice was not suspended, but it is good that the Government says that it will review it, as it gives the sector the opportunity to lobby ministers.
