THE TWILIGHT ZONE Early years staff have long felt their status is overlooked – but now it seems that this lack of recognition is explicit. The Government census – an annual stocktake of funded children in the PVI sector, collected by local authorities and given to the DfE – is not capturing all qualifications levels: beyond Level 3, the only options are EYT, EYP or QTS. Social media has been buzzing with aggrieved participants. One said: ‘Our early years workforce has worked hard to upskill only to find we are totally disrespected.’ DfE was unable to comment.
HMRC !@$£ Some parents have found that when accessing the Childcare Choices site they have then been directed to the Tax-Free Childcare scheme, which wrongly indicates they must stop using vouchers if they want to be eligible for the 30 hours. HMRC has found an interim fix and is updating its website and helpline to make it clear how to reconfirm eligibility without leaving a voucher scheme. An HMRC spokesman said, ‘A small number of parents saw some confusing text when reconfirming their details for 30 hours free childcare. It didn’t prevent them reconfirming.’
A DIFFICULT JOB Does the online blurb for the consultancy working on the 30 hours give a sense of just what a challenge the policy is? Mott MacDonald, awarded a £3m contract with early years consultancy Hempsall’s, describes itself as a ‘global engineering, management and development consultancy focused on guiding our clients through many of the planet’s most intricate challenges.’ Indeed.
COLLATERAL DAMAGE An interesting and rather depressing point from the latest round of Ceeda data – some settings are attaching conditions to the take-up of 30 hours which they are then applying to non-30-hours places – including funded two-year olds whose parents are, by definition, some of the poorest. And these conditions include charging for extra hours.
