Nursery World - Around a quarter of early years providers still closed, research suggests

Around a quarter (24 per cent) of nursery and pre-school settings remained closed in the week beginning 1 June, despite the Government giving the go-ahead for opening early years provision to all children, a report by independent sector analysts Ceeda has found.

Around a quarter of early years settings remain closed

The most common reason given for settings remaining closed was depressed demand (47 per cent), followed by concern about health risks to staff (29 per cent) and children (23 per cent).

The data was collected from 451 nursery and pre-school settings. Of the 76 per cent of those that opened, occupancy averaged 38 per cent with the number of children attending averaging 24.

PVI Nursery and Pre-school Operating Status week commencing 1 June

The picture was similar for childminders with slightly less than a quarter (23 per cent) not opening during the week commencing 1 June out of a total of 387 childminders giving feedback. Of the 77 per cent that opened average occupancy of 36 per cent was very similar to that reported by nurseries and pre-schools. Due to the nature of provision, child numbers were considerably lower and averaged 3.43 across all open settings.

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