Childcare Bill [HL]

Earl of Listowel Excerpts

Wednesday 14th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mackay of Clashfern (Con)]

My Lords, I have listened to the comments made in support of the amendment—Amendments 30 and 31 are really just consequential. The amendment requires that the report on finance should take place before Clauses 1 to 3 come into force in an Act of Parliament. It does not require information to be provided at Report. What is more, the amendment contemplates that the clauses will be enforced before the review can take place and be completed. The arguments in support of the amendment are therefore not precisely in accordance with the amendment itself, because the terms of the amendment would be satisfied if the information came forward before the clauses were brought into force—which, of course, is after the Bill reaches the statute book.

[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

I shall make one brief comment just to remind your Lordships that there probably will not be a better opportunity in this Parliament to improve social mobility. A well-funded early education service is one of the best means to ensure that the least advantaged young people and families do better and have a fair chance equal to those who have greater privileges. What is at stake is that, if this Bill is adequately funded, we will expand that offer to many more families; more parents will go into work, lifting their children out of poverty. Yes, mainly it will benefit the middle class, but it will also benefit some of the more disadvantaged. If the Bill is not adequately funded, this will not only be a poor offer but it will steal money from and impoverish the rest of the service. So we need to be absolutely clear that we have here either an opportunity to make a difference to social mobility that we will not otherwise have in this Parliament, or an opportunity to fail. Perhaps it is comforting to realise that, because the Prime Minister’s commitment to social mobility may give us some hope that, even in this difficult financial climate, the money will be found to make this work.

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Moved by

[The Earl of Listowel]

3: Clause 1, page 1, line 3, after “that” insert “high-quality”

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, Amendments 3, 5 and the remaining amendments are in my name. I will be brief. I begin by thanking the Minister for the helpful conversation we had around family homelessness and childcare on Monday evening. As a result of that conversation, I will not move the next group of amendments in my name, and will save the time of the House by that means.

I bring back Amendment 3 on the key person in the nursery. I remind your Lordships that each child in the nursery is assigned a key person whose role is to help ensure that every child’s care is tailored to meet their individual needs and to offer continuity of care and a settled relationship for the child. That is the offer. I was really grateful to the noble Baroness for her reassuring and robust reply at Committee on this matter. I bring this back briefly on Report because that key person role is so important, because it is notoriously difficult to do well, and because it is particularly the most vulnerable children—the children from the most disadvantaged backgrounds—who need the secure attachment in the nursery. It is particularly difficult to give that child that support in the nursery. I speak to the concerns so admirably expressed by the Select Committee on Affordable Childcare when I say that it is the most disadvantaged families that need the best quality support.

I spoke to a mother this weekend. She was heavily pregnant, with three sons, and just about to celebrate two of her sons’ birthdays. I was speaking to a small group of mothers—I do not often have a chance to do that—and talked to them about the key person in the nursery. This mother said, “Ah, yes. I remember that. In the first nursery my son went to, there was the key person role, and it worked excellently. I spoke with the child carer about my child—a very good model. In my new nursery, we don’t have it. I’ll have to speak to them about it”. So there is an issue. It is not present at all nurseries. Why is this so important? Just think about the care system. Across services for children—particularly vulnerable children—we employ this model of the key worker. In youth custody, there is a key officer working with particular children; in children’s homes there is a key worker for particular children; and in our debate on the education Bill, with regard to looked-after children staying with their foster carers to the age of 21, the principle was that they had made this relationship with an important person in their lives and it is this continuity of relationship that is so important to them. It is just as important, or even more important, for three year-olds and four year-olds to have this stable relationship with a particular person. If they do not have it, they risk being either just forgotten about if they are difficult children in favour of children who are easy to deal with, or they receive multiple indiscriminate care and are passed from pillar to post. It all looks very nurturing but they are not getting the secure attachment they need to thrive.

I give the example of a man born in the mid-19th century. It seems that his parents were not very interested in him and were much more interested in pursuing their love lives with other people. His father once said to him, “You will never amount to anything”. Fortunately for this child he had a loving nanny, Mrs Everest, and so, fortunately for us, he grew up to be most successful, most robust emotionally and, despite suffering problems with the “black dog” from time to time, was able to withstand many setbacks and be of great service to this nation. We have a great deal to thank Mrs Everest for. For children from struggling families whose parents may not be getting on that well or who are experiencing difficulties, that relationship with a key person in the nursery is absolutely vital.

I wish to make two further points. First, it might be helpful to advise parents more widely about the importance of the key person role. For example, an organisation such as Mumsnet could conduct regular surveys among its users on the quality of childcare and could ask specifically about the role of the key person in the nursery and how well that is being carried out. Secondly, will the Government communicate with parents to advise them how they can identify quality and on the importance of the key person role in the nursery?

To sum up, the most vulnerable children from disadvantaged backgrounds most need this key relationship with one person, or possibly one person and a supporter, in the nursery in the provision of flexible childcare hours. We must not do anything in this legislation to water that down. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Massey of Darwen (Lab)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 11, which is part of this important group of amendments relating to the quality of childcare.

In Committee, I tabled an amendment which proposed that in all dealings with children, the welfare of the child should be paramount, in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Minister mentioned “paramount” earlier today. I do not recall the term coming up in any previous government document or discussions, but I stand to be corrected.

The amendment I am discussing is based on ensuring quality childcare, which means having good staff-to-child ratios, staff who are trained in childcare at level 3 or above, or who are in training for that, and a member of staff qualified to care for children with SEN or a disability. Funding, of course, affects all this and I share my noble friends’ concerns about funding expressed earlier.

I know that some of my dear friends round the Chamber are concerned about the qualifications issue. I am not knocking their comment that you do not necessarily need to have high-level qualifications to undertake childcare. However, I am not talking about having a PhD in physics; I am talking about people aspiring to better their childcare qualifications, thereby improving their ability to deal with child development. That is all I am saying.

The third point of the terms of reference for the Department for Education’s review of the cost of providing childcare in England does indeed speak of sufficient quality of childcare. The fifth point refers to,

“the need to secure value for money for the taxpayer, and for the entitlement to be affordable to the public purse”.

In my view, the quality of care for children far outweighs value for money for the taxpayer. I understand accountability but I maintain that the first duty of childcare is quality for the child. Without that quality, all efforts to provide childcare are useless. Quality also impinges on parents going to work. Quality impinges on social mobility. No parent is going to place a child into poor-quality early years care or education. Indeed, surveys show that the top two requirements for parents are, first, location and, second, quality.

I note that many organisations share my concern. The National Association of Head Teachers states that the failure to address funding—the important issue raised earlier today—will compromise quality and that early years education, not just childcare, is essential in order to have an impact on child development. The Local Government Association talks of the danger of an underfunded system. The National Day Nurseries Association in its excellent analysis of this Bill is concerned about the threat of low pay and about recruitment and retention of staff. It suggests looking over the long term in a cross-departmental way at childcare funding and the development of a workforce strategy to improve quality. I agree.

The Special Educational Consortium has pointed out that 60% of parents with disabled children do not believe that childcare providers can cater for their child’s disability. It proposes that the Childcare Bill be amended to require the largest childcare centres to have an early years special educational needs co-ordinator. The Association for Professional Development in Early Years states that in relation to sufficient provision, quality of staff and the development of the health care and education plan is vital.

The importance of staffing could not be clearer. Skill and confidence in caring for and educating children with special needs are vital for the confidence of parents and the well-being of the child. In small settings, area special educational needs co-ordinators could be in place to advise parents and plan for health and education needs.

I hope that the Government will respond sympathetically to this group of amendments and ensure that quality of childcare is reflected in all their deliberations.

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[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for his careful response and to noble Lords who have tabled amendments and taken part in this important debate on quality. I should first point out that I made a couple of omissions in my opening statement because of my wish for brevity. The man I spoke of was, of course, Winston Churchill. Also, the Minister kindly made some comments to me earlier but I was not in my place. I assure him that I was stretching my legs behind the Bar and heard every word he said, but it was not a good time to choose to do so. I apologise for that.

I am grateful to the Minister for taking the time to answer in detail on these important matters. It is good to be reminded that he is developing a strategy for the early years workforce. It is most important to all of us, I am sure. I listened with interest to the debate about the importance of Ofsted versus the importance of high-quality qualifications for staff. I am very familiar with this issue from discussions about children’s homes, and there seems to be a parallel. Within the culture of residential care for looked-after children in this country, there is a strong conservative bias towards a low-qualified workforce and a high level of regulation. Many people working in this field and many authoritative figures would say, “We do not need higher qualified staff; we need good regulation and we will work with what we’ve got”. I have followed this issue for many years and have always taken the opposite view. We need highly qualified staff when working with such vulnerable children—even more so than the staff on the continent, who are definitely more highly qualified. I am very sympathetic to the argument of the noble Lord, Lord Storey. We should start with high-quality teachers and professionals, and then regulate to make sure everything is done properly. That is the motor to real improvement.

There is a concern about private group provision and the percentage of early years teachers in those settings. We should not be too prescriptive but we know how important having professionals in early years settings is, particularly for the most disadvantaged children. It is a matter of concern that nearly 50% of independent group providers do not have early years teachers in those settings. I am sure that this will be debated further in the other place. I welcome the Minister’s many comments about the improvement in the qualifications of the workforce during the last Government. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 3 withdrawn.

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[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

My Lords, this new clause makes amendments to existing provisions of primary legislation that are consequential on the new duty on the Secretary of State under Clause 1 of this Bill and the Secretary of State’s powers to make regulations for the purpose of discharging that duty.

The proposed amendment to Section 99 of the Childcare Act 2006 would enable the Secretary of State to require childcare providers who deliver the extended entitlement to supply basic information about children receiving free childcare to local authorities and to the Secretary of State. Since 2008, childcare providers who deliver the current early education entitlement have been required to provide individual child-level data to local authorities and the Secretary of State through the school census and the early years census. The information collected enables the department to monitor take-up of free places and measure the success of the early education entitlement. Take-up rates are then published annually.

Take-up rates are key to ensuring that funding for the early entitlement is properly allocated to local authorities and, in turn, to providers. This also enables us to identify any children who are accessing more childcare than they are entitled to, which is vital in order to guard against abuse of the system. We wish to do the same for the new extended entitlement. Providing basic information about children in their care, such as their name, date of birth and the number of government-funded hours they take up, does not place an undue administrative burden on providers, as it is information they hold as a matter of course.

I should also like to reassure noble Lords that robust safeguards are in place that prohibit publication of the data in a form that names or identifies individual children. The collection and use of data by the Secretary of State, local authorities and other specified persons is, in any case, also bound by the provisions of the Data Protection Act. I am sure that noble Lords agree that making provision to enable local authorities and the Government to collect data on children accessing free childcare is key to enabling us to monitor the successful delivery of the entitlement.

Secondly, I turn to the amendment to the School Standards and Framework Act. That Act, together with regulations made under it, sets the legal and budgetary framework for the allocation of financial assistance by local authorities to maintained schools, and to private, voluntary and independent providers of free early years provision in their area. This amendment extends that legal framework to financial assistance provided to settings delivering the new entitlement to 30 hours of free childcare for working parents.

I hope that noble Lords agree that it is important that we monitor take-up of the extended entitlement and that the existing legal framework for the allocation of funding by local authorities to childcare providers is updated to reflect this new entitlement. I urge noble Lords to accept this amendment, and I beg to move.

[The Earl of Listowel]

My Lords, will the data give information about the number of homeless families that are taking up the entitlement, for instance, or about the number of families with children in income poverty taking up the entitlement? If it is helpful to her, I am happy for the Minister to write to me.

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I will happily write to the noble Earl.