Funding cuts halt training of carer

Cuts in funding for childcare students have prompted one provider to focus on management training instead, suggesting that Government policy is having the opposite effect of its stated aim of raising the numbers of trained childcarers.

Elizabeth Boyd, managing director of the Berkshire-based Chiltern Training, said last week that it is now concentrating on teaching childcare management 'because the money's dropped for childcare'. She said, 'You need as many qualified childcare workers out there as humanly possible, but if the Government won't pay for it there's not a lot you can do about it.'

Under the old regime, a trainee aged 19 or over taking a Modern Apprenticeship would cover both NVQ 2 and NVQ 3 over two to three years and would have received funding of around 5,000 to 6,000. But when the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) took over from the Training and Enterprise Councils (TECs) and the Further Education Funding Council in April, the money available for the new advanced Modern Apprenticeship dropped to just 2,730, covering only 18 months, and students were expected to go straight into NVQ 3 without taking NVQ 2 first. Alternatively, they could take a foundation Modern Apprenticeship (formerly national traineeship) and aim for NVQ 2.