Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the average number of funded hours used by families was per week by people with 30 hours places during the September term in 2017.

The department undergoes an annual Early Years Census in order to allocate funding for the free entitlements to local authorities, and to gather data on the uses of these entitlements. This data will be captured in January with the data being made available in the summer. We therefore do not currently hold data on the average number of funded hours used by people accessing a 30 hours place during the autumn term.

However, we do know that an average of 25.2 funded hours per week were taken up in Early Implementer areas, and 26.5 hours per week within the Early Rollout areas, by people accessing a 30 hours place during early delivery. More information on how the 30 hours was delivered in our early delivery areas is available via the links below.

Early Implementer evaluation report: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/629460/Evaluation_of_early_implementation_of_30_hours_free_childcare_.pdf

Early Rollout Evaluation report: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/642007/Evaluation_of_early_rollout_of_30-hours_free_childcare.pdf