Childcare Bill

Angela Richardson Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 29th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Angela Richardson (Guildford) (Con)]

It is always a privilege to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis)—not to forget Kidsgrove and Talke. And he does talk; he talks with passion and is very knowledgeable about this subject, so it was fantastic to listen to his contribution.

I pay a huge tribute to the hon. Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda). In my former role as Parliamentary Private Secretary in the Department for 19 months, I got to sit in on Westminster Hall debates, in which he participated. I recognise the considered and genuine approach that he brought to all debates on childcare and special educational needs, and I now understand why. I did not realise that he is a former civil servant in the Department for Education. It is great that he can bring that background to his role as a Member of Parliament.

I agree with the hon. Gentleman fundamentally on the importance of funding and investment in early years. My background is working in investment banking, so I am always looking at return on investment. I also looked at it as a parent myself. I decided to stay at home and look after my children. It was really important to me that I could put that investment into them, but I also took the opportunity to put my children into childcare and nursery when they were little, because I recognised its importance for socialisation.

Let me turn to the funding. I was delighted when the Chancellor announced the investment that was going into the first 1,001 days of a child’s life, from birth to the age of two. I acknowledge the work of my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire (Dame Andrea Leadsom), who has been such a champion on this matter. She has been working on it for such a long time, over a couple of years, with other colleagues in the House. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory), who worked with my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire, and thank her for the experience that she brings to the issue.

I was delighted to hear about the investment in family hubs. That is a 2019 general election manifesto commitment and I can really see its value. I was able to visit my maintained nursery in Guildford with the former Children’s Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford (Vicky Ford). It was a fantastic opportunity to see how childcare was being delivered in my community—and in a deprived part of my community as well. What I recognised was the number of children with special educational needs. I thought that the ratio of those children to other children who were attending was quite high. I understood the concerns of the nursery about the funding that it was receiving to be able to manage not just the number of neurotypical children who needed those childcare places, but also the number who had extra needs, which was sometimes quite high. Quite a lot of staff are needed to look after those children.

We also have to look at the structure of nurseries, including the layers of management and the people who are doing all the face-to-face work. Sometimes, we need to ensure that the structure is right so that the children are getting that time and energy, and it is not being put into having to tick boxes, fill in forms and so on. That was a fantastic visit, and I hope that the new Children’s Minister will be able to visit other nurseries in my constituency.

I also pay a huge tribute to nursery teachers. A nursery teacher was instrumental in identifying that my son had additional educational needs and suggested that he needed what is now an education and health care plan—it had a slightly different name all those years ago—and get help with speech and language therapy. The people who go into those roles care so genuinely for young people, and that gives a parent the support that they need.

Clause 3, which would promote the availability of free childcare, is important for families like mine and others who do not have social networks and structures around them. I did not have them because I was an immigrant who had to make all my friends—it was a lonely time being a new mum in a new country—but we also need to address loneliness in other parts of our communities. I hope that in bringing forward the Bill and hearing supportive comments from hon. Members across the House, the hon. Gentleman feels that he has started to have some success in raising awareness, particularly among the disadvantaged groups that he wants to talk to.

I echo the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Jane Hunt) and recommend that anyone reading my speech goes back to hers, because she listed everything that the Government have been doing. Having worked closely for 19 months in the Department until recently, I saw the care and commitment of Ministers to children in their early years and to children who are vulnerable. I also echo the comments of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North. Childcare is expensive and choices have to be made by people—often women—who ought to be able to carry on with their careers without such a high burden of cost. They should not have to take themselves out of the workforce.

We must also look at the supply side and encourage young people towards childcare when they are looking at their career options, because it is an amazing career and parents such as me value what those people put in. I also encourage men to step forward. The sector has many young women and more mature women in it, but we need men, too. There was a fantastic man in my son’s nursery, and those men can bring role modelling. Let us have a conversation about taking away some of the stigma and making childcare an easier choice for men. It is a worthwhile career. I thank the hon. Member for Reading East for bringing forward the Bill and look forward to working with him, as I am sure everyone in the Chamber does, to realise some of its aims.