Nursery World - 'Chronic childcare shortages risk Government plans'

Local authorities’ failure to monitor childcare provision, and a lack of available places, risks putting the Government’s childcare plans in jeopardy, warns a new report.

‘Access denied: a report on childcare sufficiency and market management in England and Wales’, reveals that a quarter of English local authorities (38), have failed to carry out and publish assessments of local childcare since 2012, despite being required to do so every year by law. The local authorities include Harrow, Bristol, Torbay and Tower Hamlets.

Published by the Family and Childcare Trust, the report goes on to suggest the Department for Education holds local authorities that fail to meet the statutory duty to account by making early education funding conditional on them monitoring and publishing data on their childcare sufficiency.

The charity’s research also highlights a shortage of places across England and Wales for three- and four-year-olds, disadvantaged two-year-olds and for out-of-school care.

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