We are approaching the first anniversary of the 30 hours ‘free’ childcare offer – a stark reminder that summer is nearly over!
The problem of funding rates that providers say are not enough to ensure their sustainability has been constant throughout this first year of the policy, with survey after survey highlighting nurseries’ and childminders’ concerns.
Now, however, a new challenge is coming to the fore, as we reveal in our news story on page 12. Many parents who had been receiving 15 hours were so happy to suddenly have double that number handed to them that they were quite content to pay for ‘extras’ – meals, trips and so on.
But parents who have just become or are becoming eligible for 30 hours are proving to be unwilling to pay charges for something that has been advertised as ‘free’.
Some are refusing to pay for ‘consumables’, some are moving children to other settings that don’t make charges. We even heard of parents who can’t or won’t pay for meals and refuse to send in a packed lunch, leaving nurseries no alternative but to provide food, as who would leave a child hungry in these circumstances?
There are two aspects that need looking at and revising. One is that the 30 hours should stop being mis-sold as free rather than funded.
The other is the muddle of telling providers that they can charge for ‘extras’ and that parents ‘should’ expect to pay, while also saying that parents can’t be required to pay anything as a condition of taking up a 30 hours place. That way lies misunderstandings, resentment, children moved from settings where they are happy, more settings opting out of offering the hours, and an increasingly two-tier system.
Another way forward is, of course, to fund the hours properly so that extras are not necessary – but I think we all know how likely that is!
This issue’s contributors
Natalie Perera is executive director and head of research at the Education Policy Institute, having worked in the DfE from 2002-14, helping to deliver the 2005 Childcare Act. She writes a monthly column for Nursery World, this time looking at the ‘iron triangle’ of early years quality.
Jennifer Gaggis manager of Bright Horizons’ Tabard Square Nursery, and tells us how her team supported Samaya, who moved with her parents from India at the age of one, to attend nursery for the first time. Their experience in settling in children from abroad proved invaluable.
Sarah Cox is a family support worker for getset services in the Glastonbury Hub, Somerset. She explains her research with multi-agency professionals into resilience, which formed part of her Childhood Studies degree at Yeovil College, and gives advice on fostering this in children and adults.
