Researchers compared two phases of the Government’s £5m Can Parent pilot, launched in April 2012, and found the withdrawal of £100 vouchers harmed the scheme’s popularity.
The subsidy was scrapped in 2014, part way through the three-year trial, and providers had to either seek funding from parents or community organisations.
The researchers said the number of providers actively providing classes then more than halved to four.
Due to the lack of classes on offer the number of parents enrolling in phase two was just 164 - compared with 2,956 during phase one, the study found. Critics considered the earlier larger figure to be low in itself, reflecting just 5 per cent of eligible parents.
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