Nursery World - Hard facts of funding gap revealed

The true scale of the funding shortfall for childcare places in the
early years sector is revealed in new research from the Pre-School
Learning Alliance. Ruth Thomson takes a look at the numbers.

Private, voluntary and independent (PVI) settings are facing a funding shortfall of up to a fifth (21 per cent) in delivering high-quality childcare places under the free entitlement, while a third (30 per cent) of local authorities have made no change to their PVI base rate since implementing an early years single funding formula (EYSFF) three or four years ago, according to new figures.

The scale of the underfunding has emerged in independent research commissioned by the Pre-School Learning Alliance (PLA) and is backed by the Alliance's Freedom of Information (FOI) request to all local authorities in England about their free entitlement base rates.

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