Childcare Bill [HL]

Baroness Massey of Darwen Excerpts

Wednesday 14th October 2015 Lords Chamber

[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.

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield (LD)]

I speak to Amendment 23 standing in my name. In so doing I give my broad support to Amendment 11 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, that covers similar ground. The policy statement on this Bill that we recently received stated that the workforce is the key driver of high-quality childcare. I agree—we probably all agree with that. I welcome the Government’s commitment to exploring career progression routes in 2016 and look forward to hearing more about these plans from the Minister. However, more needs to be done to support new entrants to the sector. This is the primary purpose of my amendment on minimum workforce qualifications.

The Affordable Childcare Committee felt that it was crucial to increase the proportion of staff qualified at a higher level in the private, voluntary and independent sector in order to drive up overall quality and improve outcomes for children. Setting a minimum qualification level for working with young children at level 3 was suggested by Professor Nutbrown during her review of early education and childcare. This would help to level the playing field and to ensure that where children grow up and live has much less of an impact on the quality of care and education that they receive than, sadly, is sometimes the case at the moment. It is telling that new evidence from Ofsted has identified that settings that have at least 75% of their practitioners qualified to level 3 achieve better inspection results. Indeed, the Nuffield Foundation recently reported on a strong relationship between the level of staff qualifications, the quality of provision, as judged by Ofsted and, most importantly of all, outcomes for young children.

The second part of my amendment is around disabled children. There is overwhelming evidence that parents of those children are struggling to access their current entitlement to childcare. Indeed, in 2014, the Department for Education found that only 40% of parent carers believe that the childcare providers in their area can cater for their child’s disability. Last year, the parliamentary inquiry into childcare for disabled children concluded that lack of staff skill and confidence was often the reason for parents,

“being subtly discouraged or simply turned away by a provider”.