Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress has been made on delivering 30 hours of free childcare.

Early delivery of 30 hours free childcare was successful with over 15,000 places delivered to eligible parents across the 12 areas. The independent evaluation of our early delivery areas showed that 78% of parents reported greater flexibility in their working life as a result of 30 hours, and nearly a quarter of mothers and one in 10 fathers reported they had been able to increase their working hours. These independent evaluation reports are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-rollout-of-30-hours-free-childcare-evaluation and https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/30-hours-free-childcare-early-implementation-evaluation.

On 1 September, 30 hours free childcare was rolled out nationally. As of 31 August, 216,384 eligibility codes had been issued for the autumn term and, as of 6 November, 93% of these eligibility codes had been validated via the Eligibility Checking System (ECS). This information is referred to in the following management information release: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/30-hours-free-childcare-eligibility-codes-issued-and-validated.

On 19 December we will publish an experimental statistics release ’30 hours free childcare: Autumn term 2017’ which will include a local council breakdown of codes issued and validated.