Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the National Audit Office's value for money report entitled Preparations to extend early years entitlements for working parents in England on the expansion of government funded childcare, published on 24 April 2024, which local authorities she estimates will need to increase their childcare hours by 20% or more by September 2025.

As the National Audit Office (NAO) recently reported, the department has developed a model to estimate supply and demand nationally and locally. This allows the department to estimate the required increases in early years hours to meet demand for key delivery milestones.

The regional differences are illustrated in Figure 11 of the NAO report. Further detail of this analysis has not been published. It has been shared directly with local authorities to use alongside their local intelligence and support local sufficiency assessments.

The supply and demand model is updated regularly with the latest data, including as more parents apply for eligibility codes and the department has an improved understanding of local demand.

The indicative output of this supply and demand modelling is only one factor the department takes into account when judging the scale of the challenge a local authority faces. The department also accounts for the local authorities own assessment of supply and demand and their responses to the departments readiness assessments.