Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the costs to local authorities of child care provision; and what assistance they plan to provide to local authorities to help meet such costs.

We will be spending around £6 billion on childcare support in 2019 to 2020 - a record amount. That will include funding for our free early education entitlements, on which we plan to spend around £3.5 billion this year alone.

The early years national funding formula, which we introduced in April 2017 following extensive consultation, allocates our funding to local authorities fairly and transparently.

The department allows local authorities to retain some funding to cover administrative costs and statutory duties, so long as the vast majority, 95%, is passed on to providers.

The government recognises the need to keep the evidence base on costs up-to-date. We continue to monitor the provider market closely through a range of regular and one-off research projects which provide insight into various aspects of the provider market.