Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of reducing staff-to-child ratios in early years settings on (a) the fees charged by those settings for early years provision and (b) staff retention and recruitment in those settings.

The consultation on ‘Childcare: regulatory changes’ closed on 16 September. The department will respond in due course.

Alongside the consultation, the department ran a survey of early years providers to establish the likely impact of the changes on providers, should government guidelines be changed. This survey will be published in due course.

Responses from the consultation and the survey will help to build the evidence base, including understanding more around the potential impact of any changes to the fees charged by settings and to staff recruitment and retention.

The department’s priority continues to be to provide safe, high-quality early years provision for young children.