Children: Day Care

(asked on 16th December 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will extend the adjusted calculation for the early education entitlement funding, used during the autumn 2020 term, into spring 2021, in line with the extension to the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.


Answered by
Vicky Ford Portrait
Vicky Ford
This question was answered on 27th January 2021

We recognise childcare attendance has been affected by the COVID-19 outbreak; we saw attendance rise over the autumn term from 482,000 on 10 September to 759,000 on 17 December 2020. On 17 December 2020, the government therefore announced a return to funding early years settings on the basis on attendance. In line with the existing and unchanged statutory guidance (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/use-of-free-early-education-entitlements-funding-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak/use-of-free-early-education-entitlements-funding-during-coronavirus-covid-19), local authorities should ensure that providers are not penalised for short-term absences of children, (for example, sickness, arriving late or leaving early, or a family emergency through withdrawing funding), but use their discretion where absence is recurring or for extended periods, taking into account the reason for the absence and the impact on the provider.

We will fund local authorities in the 2021 spring term based on their January 2021 census. If attendance rises after the census is taken, we will top-up councils to up to 85% of their January 2020 census level, where a local authority can provide evidence for increased attendance during the spring term. This will give local authorities additional financial confidence to pay providers for increasing attendance later in the spring term.

We stay in regular contact with the early years sector and have heard from them already on this subject. We publish regular official statistics on attendance in early years settings (https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/attendance-in-education-and-early-years-settings-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-outbreak) and the next release is due on Tuesday 2 February. We will be closely monitoring both parental take-up of places and the capacity and responses of providers.

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