Free Childcare

Kirsten Oswald Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Helen Jones (Warrington North) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered e-petition 132140 relating to free childcare.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies.

The petition has so far garnered more than 132,000 signatures, but the amount of public engagement generated through the Petitions Committee has been quite astonishing. We have had 33,000 posts on our Facebook page, which has been viewed by more than 492,000 people. I did a webchat, which, for someone so useless with technology, is a step forward in itself. A number of people also emailed me personally and some of the stories they told were quite heart-breaking.

The difficulties that many parents have to go through simply to go out to work ought to give us all in the House pause for thought. Because of the difficulties they face, some of those parents, understandably, are quite angry, and sometimes their anger—not in the majority of cases—turns against the wrong target, which is those getting free childcare for two-year-olds. I want to set out the position as it is because there is a misunderstanding. Many people think that free childcare for two-year-olds is only available to parents who are unemployed, but that is not the case.

As we all know, all three and four-year-olds are currently entitled to 15 hours of free childcare for 38 weeks of the year. The provision was brought in by the Labour Government for four-year-olds for 33 weeks of the year, and it was gradually extended. It is a universal provision and most families take up their entitlement. That Government also sought to start to extend free childcare to the most disadvantaged two-year-olds, and the coalition Government broadened that further. It is available not only to those on income support or income-based jobseeker’s allowance, but to children in the poorest working families: those in receipt of tax credits and—the last time I looked—with an income of less than just over £16,000. Crucially, the provision is also available to looked-after children, to children with disabilities and to children with special educational needs. I say that it is available to the children, rather than the parents, because that particular policy is aimed at tackling disadvantage in the early years so that children are ready to start school and benefit properly from their education.

The Government have taken a different course, and seek to extend free childcare for three and four-year-olds to 30 hours a week. Crucially, that is not a universal provision. It is for working parents only, and will be subject to minimum and maximum income limits. It is currently in the pilot stage, and I have reservations, which I will come to later, about how it will be paid for. There is no doubt that the situation is very confusing for parents, and it is understandable that many of them are very angry at the problems they face because the cost of childcare has risen alarmingly in the past few years. It rose by 30% on average between 2010 and 2015, which is five times higher than the rise in wages. The parents who have contacted me have told me about the problems they face not just with childcare during the day, but in getting after-school childcare and holiday care.

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

The hon. Lady is making an important point about the need for flexibility in the timing of childcare. I am particularly encouraged that the Scottish Government, after a major consultation, have launched a series of trials to ensure that, in Scotland, we can offer places where and when families need them. Does she agree that those steps are significant in making the provisions work for everyone?

[Helen Jones]

I agree with the hon. Lady that we need flexible provision of childcare because what we have does not always fit with parents’ working hours. I will come to that later, but first I will give a few examples of the cost to parents.

Of course, costs vary throughout the country, but so do wages. One lady who contacted me from the north-west said that her family pay £840 a month for three days of childcare a week. Now, they are not highly paid and, to put it into context, that is exactly the same amount as their mortgage payment. Another parent from Surrey, at the other end of the country, got in touch with me. She and her husband have a reasonable joint income of £69,000, but they have twins. They have found that the cheapest way to provide childcare for their twins is to hire a nanny, but the cost of hiring a nanny is about £25,000 a year, which is more than a third of their joint income—an astronomical sum. These parents feel caught in a trap that is not of their own making. They want to work and, in many cases, they need to work just to keep their heads above water, yet a huge chunk of their earnings is being taken by childcare.

I was also contacted by a nurse who wants to go back to work in the NHS, and the country certainly needs nurses to go back to work. She found that, for a 12.5 hour day shift, she would be just £25 better off after paying for childcare. Her solution is to work night shifts, which, for various medical reasons, are not good for her. That is an example of the barriers people face just in doing their job.

The other issue that many parents raised with me was one of access, and that seems to be particularly true when one partner is in the armed forces. One family contacted me—again, not pleading poverty. They said, “We have a good income”, but they found that every time they moved, the decent nurseries, at a reasonable cost, were full, and they charge—certainly in the south of England—between £50 and £100 per child just to be put on the waiting list. Frankly, that is a rip-off that the Government could and should end very quickly.

Another member of the armed forces—a single parent who is not earning a high income—told me of the real difficulty she faced in finding childcare that would fit with her irregular working hours. Another family told me that when they move, they find that some local authorities provide free childcare for two-year-olds of military families, and that others do not, but those families have no control over where they are posted or, therefore, whether they can access that provision.

These are parents who are trying to do the right thing and set a good example to their children but, naturally enough, they want the best provision for their children, as we would all want for our children. That is why we should be talking about early years provision and early years education, rather than childcare. We want to provide the best we can for our very youngest children, but the problem is that for many years there has not been sufficient investment in the sector, and there are not sufficient qualified staff. I am convinced, as someone who began her career as a secondary teacher, that if we invested more in the early years, we would prevent many problems further along in the education system. Such a move would pay us because it is the right thing to do not only morally, but economically.

The last Labour Government recognised that problem and they particularly recognised the difficulty of ensuring that we had a sufficiently skilled workforce. Therefore, part of the job of Sure Start centres, which became children’s centres, was about providing day care, but it was also about giving advice to parents and, crucially, working with other providers and childminders to raise standards across the sector. It therefore seems a tragedy that the coalition Government decided to remove from centres in the most deprived areas not only the obligation to provide full day care but the need to employ a qualified teacher. There are some Ministers—I except the Minister present from this—who believe that anyone can teach, but I assure her that that is not the case. I suspect that many members of the Government would not last a day in early years provision. I know that I would not, and I am a qualified teacher. Early years provision is a highly skilled occupation if we are going to do it properly.

At the same time, the Government set up the early intervention grant and ended the ring-fencing of funding for children’s centres. They then reduced the grant year by year, meaning that not enough money was going into the system. The House of Commons Library estimates that the predecessor grants that were rolled up into the early years grants were worth £2.79 billion in 2010. Immediately on taking office, the coalition Government reduced the sum to £2.48 billion, and to £2.24 billion the year after—that is 10% lower than what they spent the previous year and 20% lower than planned. Two thirds of that money was spent on the under-fives, which gives an idea of the impact of the grants on the whole sector.

There was no extra money when the coalition Government expanded childcare for two-year-olds. They paid for it by moving some of the early intervention grant across to the dedicated schools grant, thus starving the rest of the sector of resources. The remains of the early intervention grant continue to go down. The grant was part of the start-up funding assessment when the Government changed to a business rate retention scheme for local government finance, and it was £1.71 billion in 2013, going down to £1.58 billion the following year. This year it is £1.32 billion and, if the indicative totals we have are right, by 2019-20 it will be just over £1 billion.

What is the point of this ramble through the byzantine pathways of local government finance? I must admit that I find it fascinating, but I have never found anyone else who does. The simple reason is that we can have good early years provision and we can have cheap early years provision, but we cannot have good, cheap early years provision. The real problem with what the Government are doing is that it pushes more of the cost on to parents because the free hours are underfunded, and it ensures that the expertise that was being built up in children’s centres is gradually disappearing as they close and as the services they offer are restricted.

There is doubt about whether the extended hours that the Government are offering will be properly funded. The National Audit Office published a report earlier this year in which it said that there was real difficulty because the Government’s implementation of the provision will mean the end of much cross-subsidisation. At the moment if a parent has, say, 40 hours’ childcare a week, 15 of those hours are paid for by the local authority but at a fairly low rate. The hours that the parent takes on are paid at a higher rate to cross-subsidise the other hours. If the Government do not properly fund the extra hours, several things could happen: the quality might reduce; many providers might not take part in the scheme at all; or there might be a further cost for parents because providers decide to charge more for other types of childcare, such as childcare for the under-twos, holiday provision and out-of-hours provision.

Several providers that have contacted me say that they are already struggling to keep going, even though low wages are endemic in the sector. Staff have contacted me about how little they earn, which makes it even more difficult to attract good, skilled staff. Those issues are important to parents because the Government estimate that the parents of some 390,000 children will want to take up the extra hours, which means an extra 45,000 places are needed. In fact, even more places are likely to be needed as the figure is likely to be an underestimate. If the policy is successful in getting more parents into work or in getting parents to work extra hours, even more childcare places will be needed. The Government’s response was to announce last year that they would increase the average national funding rate for early years to £4.88 an hour from £4.56 an hour for three and four-year-olds. That, of course, is an average. Many councils do not pay that amount because they are having such difficulty funding even statutory services that there is not enough money left to fund early years services.

It is fair to say that many providers found the Government’s response unconvincing. The Family and Childcare Trust told the Childcare Public Bill Committee that it was

“unlikely to be sufficient to address the strategic challenge the 30 hour offer presents”.

The National Day Nurseries Association found in a survey of its members that only 45% were likely or very likely to take part in the scheme. If so, the shortage of places that we already face will simply get worse. Already 45% of councils in England do not have enough places for families who work full time.

The second issue to which the Government must face up is where most three and four-year-olds access this provision. Some 58% of them are in the maintained sector, usually in nursery classes attached to a primary school. Many of those schools are on restricted sites and would not be able to expand even if capital funding were available, which at present seems fairly unlikely. There is also a bulge in the number of primary-aged children coming through the system. It does not take a genius to work out that if it is having to address a bulge in the number of primary schoolchildren as well as extra demand for nursery places, any school that can expand will expand to meet the primary provision because it has to—it is as simple as that.

At the same time, the Government risk hugely damaging the best provision in the childcare sector, which is in maintained nurseries. Some 60% of maintained nurseries are rated “outstanding” by Ofsted, and 39% are rated “good.” Nowhere else in the education system even gets near that level of supply. In their consultation on early years funding, the Government say that they want to fund all providers equally. Wherever they are, each child will receive the same amount of funding per hour. That sounds reasonable until we understand that nursery schools are required to employ qualified teachers and a qualified head, and many of the heads in this sector are very well qualified indeed. Nursery schools also provide training places for staff. They do outreach work not only with families but with other providers. The very good maintained nursery in my constituency, Sandy Lane, is based on the same site as a children’s centre and a private nursery precisely so that the three can work together, but they need the funding to do that.

We are in a position where we risk getting rid of the best provision, or hugely damaging it, where the Government are underfunding childcare and where the cost is being heaped on to parents for the extra hours they purchase. Frankly, it is a mess. It is a national disgrace that we treat our youngest children in that way. By trying to do it on the cheap, we are putting huge stress on working families. I would love to be able to say that we can deliver free childcare for all working families, but we cannot do so without more money in the system and without more training for staff.

That situation cannot be solved overnight—it cannot, I believe, even be solved in one Parliament—but we need a national strategy for early years. The Government should consider it seriously and set up an inquiry, perhaps a royal commission, staffed by experts. I know that some Government Members do not like experts, but we need them. They are experts because they know something about the subject. The inquiry should do several things. It should chart a path to, if not free, at least heavily subsidised early years provision, and it should lay out how we can grow the workforce that we need. At the moment, for instance, when we need nursery nurses the most, the number of applications for training is falling. The inquiry should also set out how we can raise the skill levels of people already working in the field.

At the moment, if we are honest, a lot of children are being cared for by unqualified teenagers, who might be nice people doing their level best but who do not have the skills necessary to develop the minds of young children, at an age at which they are developing more rapidly than at any other time in their lives and need constant care. We must amend that to give them the best. I hope that such an inquiry would have all-party support, so that we could take a consistent approach through several Parliaments.

I recognise that it will not be enough to alleviate the problems that parents face now. I urge the Government to consider seriously what they can do to support parents. The first thing that they should do is end a policy that threatens the best provision in the sector. The Government need to consider how to develop maintained nursery schools, how nursery classes attached to primary schools can expand and what capital provision can be given for that. They also need seriously to consider raising the hourly rate paid for the care of under-fives. If they do not, decent providers in the private sector will not be able to continue. Those who try to provide good, decent childcare cannot do it without proper funding. The Government should work much more with businesses to develop workplace nurseries—not simply providing vouchers, but talking to businesses and explaining why nurseries are vital to retaining a trained workforce and why they benefit businesses as well as children.

The Government should also consider giving parents decent help now with the costs of childcare, perhaps by extending child tax credit or by other methods. What is happening now is not helping families or children. We need to stop thinking of early years provision as an add-on that we think about after we have thought about the rest of the education system and realise that it is the way to tackle disadvantage and ensure more social mobility. If the Government concentrated on early years provision rather than grammar schools, they would do much better.

[Kirsten Oswald]

The point about disadvantage is key. Mark McDonald, the Scottish Government Minister for Childcare and Early Years, has identified that high-quality early learning and childcare plays a vital role in narrowing the attainment gap, which is why there is such a commitment to increasing early childcare and education provision.

[Helen Jones]

It is certainly true that it narrows the gap, but I want to make the point that it is good for all children. All children deserve the best provision that we can offer them, and we are not offering them that at the moment. We need to get a grip on the situation, for the sake of families in this country and of our children. If we do not, although we might not pay for early years provision immediately, we will pay the price further down the line in educational failure, social disadvantage and children not reaching their full potential. I urge the Minister, when she replies, to take the issue seriously so that we can at last move forward in this often-forgotten and certainly underfunded area of our education system.

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in this debate and to serve under your chairship, Mr Davies, and to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones), who has given us a brilliant exposition of the current problems with funding for childcare. Hopefully I will not repeat much of it, but I think it is interesting that so many people signed the e-petition and, as she explained, wanted to get involved in this debate.

This morning, before this debate, I was lucky enough to be asked to speak on Radio Merseyside—a fabulous local radio station. Often, when I take my little girl to the school gate, I do not have much political discussion there—parents tend to be busy and not thinking about politics—but it was notable to me that this morning when I dropped off my lovely girl, her teacher said to me, “I’ve just heard you on the radio talking about childcare,” and proceeded to talk to me about all the issues. It does not surprise me at all that my hon. Friend has had the experience of all those people getting in touch with her. This is one of the most significant issues that faces our country, and even though it may not appear to be high politics in the conventional sense, it is where politics in our country could most influence families’ lives for good.

I will go back to basics and talk about the principles of why Government should be involved in childcare, and then make a couple of points about how we should do so. In the end, support for families and children, and for parents at work, goes back a long way in our country. Beveridge recognised when he was considering what made people poor that there were two times in people’s lives when they had less earning capacity and extra cost. One of those was when they got old, and the other was when they had children.

Beveridge recognised that having kids had the power to plunge families into poverty that they would not be in otherwise. That is why he designed family support as part of the very nature of our welfare state. He thought that people should be able to smooth their costs over their lives and receive state assistance at times when they had extra costs and less capacity to earn, so that when they had the ability to pay in, they could do so, smoothing their income over their lives to prevent poverty. That is the principle of our welfare state, and it always has been.

Beveridge knew something else as well about preventing families from being poor. He knew that Government needed to be committed to the principles of full employment and prepared to provide public services to underpin good health and good education, to ensure that people had the ability not just in theory but in practical terms to get a job. When I read the e-petition as submitted, with its emphasis on helping working people, I agree with my hon. Friend that that is exactly what our country should be all about. That is why I think we should adopt the same principles, attitude and approach that Beveridge did when he designed our welfare state.

However, there is a crucial difference between the labour market then and now: people like me can get a job. Women now rightly expect to go to work. It turns out that once the historic prejudices against women in the workplace were removed—piece by piece, by those women in the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s to whom I owe every chance that I have had as a woman in the workplace—women in great numbers wanted to go to work and have a career. We therefore need to fundamentally rethink the way in which the Government support families when their children are small, and we need to confront the fact that our labour market is now very different. That means that, as a country, we must applaud the nature and instinct of people who want to go to work and we must seek to provide good public services to back up that driving instinct. That simple conclusion is supported by the contribution of the woman who spoke before me on Radio Merseyside this morning, a dedicated Scouse nan called Linda who had gone on the radio to explain how stretched her family was; not just the mum and dad but the grandparents were trying to work and do childcare.

[Kirsten Oswald]

The hon. Lady makes a point that we should all consider very carefully, which is that this issue is not just about women—even though someone who looked around this Chamber might be forgiven for thinking that it was. It is about all of us. It is about everyone in a family: not just the children, but the parents and the wider family too.

[Alison McGovern]

I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. Of course childcare is not just a women’s issue, but it is a fact that the labour market has changed because women have joined it in greater numbers, so we have to rethink how the Government support parents in work. As it happens, I am sure that in my constituency as many men as women care about the cost of childcare. As many granddads as nans are supporting their children to take care of their children. This issue affects the whole family, older and younger alike, for all the reasons that my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington North has set out: costs are cantering away ahead of wages and successive Governments have been too slow to be radical on childcare.

Another reality that we have to face is that we have a productivity crisis in this country: we are still working longer to make less than our competitors, and I think childcare plays a hidden role in that. Over the summer I went back to work—I did days at work with different types of businesses throughout the north-west, including in retail, manufacturing and care. Managers often told me that they wanted to find people to promote from within their businesses, who could do more, earn more and drive the business forward, but that people were not able to take on that extra responsibility because of their responsibilities at home. They did not think that they necessarily had the back-up to step up and get that promotion. Businesses can get people in through the door to do the basic jobs, but helping them to move on brings the risk of their fragile family caring responsibilities being unpicked.

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[Kirsty Blackman]

It is really important that we look at how this issue is addressed in terms of devolution, and in different areas, because there are specific challenges—around specific industries, such as the one I mentioned; around rurality and the kind of distances involved in some rural areas; and around staff numbers.

We have a specific issue in Aberdeen with attracting qualified staff, because as we have historically had a lot of people working in the oil industry, where they have made lots of money, housing is more expensive than in other areas. Consequently, someone who works in childcare, or even teaching, will find it more difficult to live there. Although we have made local provision to deal with some aspects of this issue, we are not there yet, and it is necessary that local authorities, institutions and organisations can have input into how childcare provision is managed.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I am interested in what my hon. Friend says about Aberdeen, which is one of the areas taking part in a pilot scheme to examine the different models of childcare that might suit families in different areas of the country, as part of the Scottish Government’s aim to double childcare provision. Does she agree that it is very important that childcare matches the needs of not only the local area, but individual families, whose work lives may have very varied patterns?

[Kirsty Blackman]

I absolutely agree, and my hon. Friend has given me a nice opportunity to talk about the trials that we are undertaking. Nobody, certainly in the UK, has cracked this childcare thing. We have not all got it sorted; there is no way that we can look at the system and say, “It’s perfect. We’ve sussed it out.” We all need to learn from each other about what works in different areas, and ask whether those things would work in ours. The Scottish Government are undertaking three trials, on three different things that local authorities have specifically requested.

In Edinburgh, the trial is establishing outdoor nursery provision. Children who live in the centre of the city may not get out too often to the woods and forests around Edinburgh, so that local trial, in which the Scottish Government will invest £32,000, will provide access to outdoor learning for specific groups of children. We will see how that works, and will evaluate it.

In Aberdeen, in my constituency, we are having a stay-and-play session for parents of two-year-olds. A group of parents have been reluctant to leave their two-year-old in nursery provision; they are not quite sure how that would work, and perhaps think that it is a bit too far for a two-year-old. The parents will be able to stay with their two-year-old, who will still get the benefit of being in an educational setting. Also, the parents will benefit. As was said earlier, parenting small children is terrifying, and a new parent has no idea if they are doing the right thing, ever; they just have to try their best. This trial is a good opportunity for parents to learn, too.

In the Scottish Borders, the trial being undertaken by the Scottish Government is about wrap-around provision—provision outside of core hours, holiday provision and after-school provision, and provision that is more appropriate for most people with normal working lives. Hardly anybody I know can fit in a job in the three hours and 10 minutes of morning nursery care that my youngest child receives. In fact, a lot of people struggle to fit in a job between 9 am and 3.15 pm, which is when my eldest child is at school.

[Kirsten Oswald]

That is an incredibly important point. Nobody I know, or almost nobody, works from 9 am to 3 pm. If I had not been able to get childcare provision from 8 am to 6 pm, including for holidays, I would have had to stop my career progression when my children were little. It is really vital that we do not impede women, children or families in that way.

[Kirsty Blackman]

Absolutely. As the Scottish Government go forward with these pilots, and with possible changes, we will look to have much more flexibility, and much more access to nurseries and childminders, rather than just the kind of maintained provision discussed earlier; I am not sure that we use that phrase in Scotland, but I understand what it means. We look to have much more flexibility in the settings that children and young people can access with these free hours, which will allow more flexibility around hours and holidays.

I have already talked about choice and the benefits of choice. Heriot-Watt University has carried out a study for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation that says that

“reinforcing and extending the improved provision for good quality, flexible, subsidised childcare across the working year”

would be one of the “most significant measures” to tackle poverty.

We have spoken about how childcare can have the benefit of tackling poverty by changing the system for parents who cannot afford to work. We have also spoken about the benefits of childcare as regards children’s attainment; actually, it has benefits for the attainment of all children, and not just those who are starting off with a disadvantage and are, if you like, at the bottom of the pile. However, we have spoken less about the benefits for the workplace and for productivity, although that was mentioned by the hon. Member for Warrington North.

If people can access the workplace without worrying about their children, and about whether they can get home for a 3.15 school pick-up, they will concentrate more on their job, and as a result they will be more productive. The more we can do to increase the choice for parents, the better. Whether they choose to work or not to work, we need to ensure that they can make that choice at all times; that would benefit everybody, including employers.

I produced a blog for Family Friendly Working Scotland, during its National Work Life Week, that encouraged employers to consider flexible working seriously. We are trying to make clear to employers the benefits of flexible working—for them, as well as for employees. The real benefit for the employer is in improved productivity, and in having access to a talent pool to which they currently do not have access. Sometimes employers hear the words “flexible working” and think, “Panic! We can’t do that!”, but some aspects of flexible working are really very reasonable. If, for example, an employer is able to give shift patterns a couple of weeks out, instead of a week out, that makes all the difference for employees when it comes to planning and childcare. Using grandparents and other family members for childcare was mentioned earlier. Some women, parents and families do not have choice; some of them are not able to access grandparents. For example, a parent may not have a partner and so they have to try to do everything themselves.

The benefits of increasing free childcare are so wide-ranging that it is almost impossible to talk about them all in a half-hour speech, or even in a three-hour debate such as today’s. However, I think everybody recognises that increasing free childcare has huge benefits, and both the UK and Scottish Governments have made positive moves in the direction of increasing the amount of free childcare, and increasing provision, particularly around the number of hours and the changes to allow two-year-olds free nursery care.

In the future, we can learn from each other—something I always seem to find myself stressing in Westminster Hall. The Scottish Government can learn from what the UK Government are doing, and the UK Government can learn from some of the pilots that we are running, and some of the changes that we are making in Scotland. As the hon. Member for Wirral South said, local authorities and devolved institutions can learn from what is happening in other areas. They can learn whether good things that are happening elsewhere can be transferred across.

On the whole, what we are doing is largely positive, but I would like to see more of that, and more choice for parents; I would also like more access to free, high-quality childcare, and the assurance that enough funding will be provided for these things to happen.

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[Caroline Dinenage]

No, I have given way enough. In answer to her question, the figures are the Government’s figures and they are correct.

I want to make progress. We know that it is not only the most disadvantaged parents who need help with childcare costs. That is why we are increasing our investment in childcare from £5 billion to £6 billion a year by 2019-2020. We remain absolutely committed to providing 15 hours a week of early learning to all parents with three and four-year-olds. In addition to this universal entitlement, we will introduce 30 hours a week of childcare from September 2017, which will support more than 400,000 working families with three and four-year-olds, saving them around £5,000 a year in childcare costs. We want to remove the real financial barriers that prevent parents from going back to work or increasing their current hours, so that they can realise their potential and contribute to our economy and their children’s future.

[Kirsten Oswald]

I echo the Minister’s sentiments about removing financial barriers. Does she agree it is also important to remove structural barriers as far as possible by making sure there is flexibility of provision and that we do not continually assume that one size will fit all?

[Caroline Dinenage]

The hon. Lady is right. Flexibility is really important, which is why our recent consultation response committed us to offering free hours between the hours of 6 am and 8 pm to meet the needs of parents who work shifts. We also encourage local authorities and providers to offer the free hours over more than 38 weeks a year so that parents can stretch their hours, whether it is fewer hours over more weeks or during the school holidays. The flexibility that she talked about is really important.

At present, the Government are piloting the programme in eight early implementer areas. The hon. Member for Aberdeen North spoke about the importance of the really good trials going on at the moment. It is the same in the early implementer areas. Through these early implementers, more than 3,500 children have already taken up a 30-hour place one year early, which is giving their parents more disposable income and an opportunity to return to work or work more hours. We expect that figure to increase during the course of early implementation, because more parents will become eligible for the extended entitlement at different points during the year. I want to put on the record my gratitude to Hertfordshire, Newham, Northumberland, Portsmouth, Swindon, Staffordshire, Wigan, York and the childcare providers in those areas who have worked tirelessly to make the programme a reality.

The eight early implementers provide us with an opportunity to address key delivery issues for the 30-hour offer, and for us to test the practical ways that councils and providers can work together. Various Members have spoken about the specific challenges of different areas of the country: for example, the challenges in Aberdeen with the offshore workers. My constituency has a lot of families with partners in the armed forces, particularly in the Royal Navy, who face a similar challenge. That is why we have various early implementer pilots going on to look at all such challenges. For example, Northumberland is focusing on rurality and Staffordshire is focusing on work incentives, as is Swindon, along with flexibility, including the use of Saturday provision via a nursery attached to a hospital to support the staff who work there. Newham is focusing on developing a range of delivery models and supporting children with special educational needs and disabilities. Wigan and Hertfordshire are exploring partnerships through the use of childcare hubs and supporting parents back into work, and Portsmouth is supporting low-income families.

[Ian Paisley in the Chair]

Alongside our early implementers, we have also recruited 24 early innovator local authorities, which will provide valuable learning to support the roll-out of the 30-hour offer by developing approaches to support children with special educational needs and disabilities; developing scalable, flexible models that meet the needs of working parents; ensuring the sufficiency of the local childcare markets; and stimulating parental demand for the new entitlement to act as a work incentive.

I would like to point out that the consultancy that the Opposition spokesperson said £3 million is being spent on is actually not a consultancy; it is a contract to offer practical support to local authorities and childcare providers to help them get ready to deliver the 30 hours. It includes sharing lessons from the early implementers—

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[Caroline Dinenage]

As the hon. Member for Wirral South said, this is not a recent phenomenon; it has accumulated over a number of years. I can speak only from my personal experience—I know that the children of the hon. Member for Warrington North are a bit older. My children were accessing early years childcare during the years of the Labour Government, and I saw those prices go up exponentially. That is why we are dealing with this issue. In addition to various other policies that help many of the issues that have been described today, such as giving people access to flexible working and shared parental leave, which was never introduced under the previous Labour Government, more than £6 billion will be spent on childcare by 2019-20 in cash terms—[Interruption.] I know the hon. Lady is not listening, but that is more than any other Government have ever spent on this issue. It includes an extra £1 billion on the free early years entitlement.

[Kirsten Oswald]

The Minister is being very generous in giving way. Will she humour me and agree that the Scottish Government have gone further than any other Government in their commitment to early years education and childcare?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I do not know, but I am keen to learn from best practice wherever I find it, so I will be hot-footing it back to my office directly after this debate to see what we can learn from what is happening in Scotland.

A large amount of the additional money that we are spending on childcare is going to increase the average funding rate. The Opposition spokesperson said it is going down, but it is actually going to go up for private and voluntary providers in 88% of local authorities, including that of the hon. Member for Warrington North, where the hourly rate will go up by 19%.

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[Caroline Dinenage]

I am grateful for the clarification, but the hon. Lady should be aware—I hope she already is and is just playing with me—that the quality of the workforce is already good and has been improving: 87% of staff in full-day care settings are now qualified to level 3, the proportion of such staff with at least that level having grown from 75% to 87% between 2008 and 2013, while the proportion of those with a degree or higher increased from 5% to 13%. We are not, however, resting on our laurels. We have a workforce strategy that will seek to support even further those excellent people who work in our childcare environment.

[Kirsten Oswald]

Regardless of the difference of opinion between the Minister and the hon. Member for Warrington North (Helen Jones), will they both agree with me that the quality of staff in those childcare establishments is absolutely key? It is one of the main things that makes it possible for mothers and fathers to feel confident about leaving their children in such establishments. The staff’s work is exceptional.

[Caroline Dinenage]

The hon. Lady is right: the work those staff do is exceptional. Any of us who have had access to early years education all know that the quality of early years childcare is exceptional. Recent Ofsted statistics show that 91% of providers in the early years are good or outstanding, and that is the highest such figure we have ever seen. Alongside that, the most recent EYSS—early years SEN support—outcomes data show that almost 70% of children are reaching a good level of development by the age of five.

I thank all Members who have contributed to this important debate. I hope they can see that the Government care enormously about outcomes for children and childcare costs for all parents. It is completely unfair for children who are disadvantaged not to have the same opportunities as others, but the significant burden that childcare costs can have on parents is also unfair, which is why we have put in place all the measures that I have mentioned today to help solve the problem.