Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the difficulties faced by parents in accessing free childcare places for children under 9 months old.

Ensuring every child has the best start for life is a central priority for this government, including putting in place early family support services to help families to thrive in children’s first crucial months of life.

Children under 9 months are not eligible for government-funded childcare hours. Since September 2024, eligible working parents of children aged from nine months can access 15 hours of government-funded early education and childcare a week, over 38 weeks a year. This is available the term after the child turns nine months and the child's parent has a positive determination of eligibility from HMRC. So far over 200,000 parents have secured a place, and the department expects this to continue to rise in the coming weeks.