Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the findings of the Women’s Budget Group report, A Care-Led Recovery from Coronavirus, published on 30 June 2020, what steps he plans to take to increase investment in the (a) child and (b) social care sectors to create more jobs in each of those sectors.

We are planning to spend more than £3.6 billion on early education entitlements in 2020-21. During the COVID-19 outbreak, government has continued to pay early years entitlements funding to councils in the usual way. The childcare sector has also been able to access a wider package of government support in the form of a business rates holiday, business interruption loans and the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. We will also establish a new £1 billion fund from 2021 to create more high-quality wraparound and holiday childcare places for school-age children.

Councils have been given access to an additional £1.5 billion for adults and children’s social care in 2020-21 on top of maintaining £2.5 billion of existing social care grants. This will support local authorities to meet rising demand and continue to stabilise the social care system.

We recognise that the COVID-19 outbreak is imposing significant pressures on the social care sector. We have now made £3.7 billion available to local authorities so they can address pressures on local services caused by the pandemic, including in social care.

There will be a spending review in the autumn, where government will agree their overall priorities for the coming years and will take the opportunity to examine the overall funding.