Lord Storey
Main Page: Lord Storey (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Storey's debates with the Department for Education
(8 months, 1 week ago)
Lords ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Baroness Barran (Con)
It is slightly curious to say that delivery is falling short when the new entitlements start in April of this year. The noble Baroness knows that we have made a significant investment in capital to support local authorities. We have made a number of innovations in relation to the workforce and the uptake of the scheme has been very encouraging. Most importantly—I think the Institute for Fiscal Studies has confirmed this—we have announced very generous funding rates, particularly for younger children.
Lord Storey (LD)
My Lords, I think we are surprised at the confidence of the Minister, given that we have seen a 50% increase in the number of nurseries that have closed in just the last year, that 40% of nurseries say they are undecided as to whether they will deliver the new funded offer for two year-olds, and that 20% say that they will but that places will be limited. Why is the Minister so confident about this scheme? We hope she is right, but can she give us more reassurance as to why she thinks it will definitely happen?
Baroness Barran (Con)
The first thing I would say is that the noble Baroness and the noble Lord are right that this is a very ambitious expansion of childcare. However, the really significant increase in capacity will be in September 2025, so we have some time to put in place what is needed to deliver on that. The noble Lord talked about the number of nurseries that have closed. I know he is also aware that the childcare workforce has gone up year on year, over 2022-23, and is up by 40,000 places—I mean that the number of places has increased in the past five years by 40,000, while there has been a 1% annual decline in nought to five year-olds.