Childcare Services Roll-out

Elizabeth Truss Excerpts

Tuesday 18th July 2017 Written Statements

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Elizabeth Truss)]

We know the cost of childcare is an important issue for working families—that is why we have made childcare more affordable, given parents more choice and raised standards of provision, supporting parents into work and helping them with the costs they face.

In total, the Government will provide over £6 billion of funding per annum in childcare support by 2019-20 to working families and those on low incomes. For parents across the UK, tax-free childcare will cut childcare costs by up to £2,000 per year for each child under 12 years old, or £4,000 per year for disabled children under 17 years old.

We introduced the childcare service on 21 April 2017 by accepting applications from parents of children under four years old (born on or after 1 September 2013). On 14 July the Government extended the service to a cohort of parents with children born on or after 1 April 2013 to ensure that these parents can access the 30 hours offer for their four year old child before the start of the school term in September. This enables even more families to benefit from the Government’s childcare offer and helps busy families with children under five who want to claim a 30 hours free childcare place for September.

The Childcare Choices website brings together all the Government’s childcare schemes in one place for the first time, and eligible parents can apply for tax-free childcare and 30 hours free childcare through a single and simple application.

They can apply for all their children at the same time once their youngest child qualifies, saving time and avoiding the need to provide the same information twice. All eligible parents will be able to apply for tax-free childcare by the end of 2017.

Parents can apply via the childcare service for both 30 hours’ free childcare and tax-free childcare. The application is straightforward and can be accessed via the childcare choices website at: https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk/.

To date, over 150,000 parents have successfully applied to the service and over 45,000 childcare providers have signed up.

[HCWS68]