Nursery World - Education the focus of the Lib Dem manifesto

Every two-year-old would be offered a childcare place, the Liberal Democrats have pledged.
UKIP also released its manifesto today.

The Liberal Democrat manifesto focuses on education and commits to protecting spending for two- to 19-year-olds in real terms over the next Parliament.

This commitment would lead to an extra £2.5 billion spending by 2020, the Liberal Democrats claim.

The funding would be used to expand early years education, ensure that there are qualified teachers in every class, recruit and retain more good teachers, and help schools to offer more one-to-one and small group tuition.

All children of working families would be eligible for free childcare of 20 hours a week between the ages of two and four years old.

The extra money will also provide 70,000 teachers, 10,000 learning support assistants and guarantee funding for the extra 460,000 children starting school through the parliament, the party says.

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