Since coming to power in May 1997 the Government has introduced a number of initiatives, including nursery places for all four-year-olds and, by 2004, all three-year-olds in England, the National Childcare Strategy and the Sure Start programme for families with children aged under four in disadvantaged areas, Early Years Development and Childcare Partnerships, Neighbourhood Nurseries in disadvantaged areas, and Early Excellence Centres, as well as great expansion in out-of-school provision.
The chief executive of the National Day Nurseries Association, Rosemary Murphy, said the Government was putting its 'emphasis on what is expedient, rather than what is best for children' in the delivery of its National Childcare Strategy. She said, 'The Government needs to realise that "more" and "faster" are not always best when it comes to caring for the under-fives. Quality, registered care appropriate to the age of the child must come first. A quick-fix solution based on ill-thought-out school-based care arrangements is not what under-fives deserve.'
Helen Penn, Professor of Early Childhood at the University of East London and a visiting fellow at the Institute of Education, said the Government still had not resolved the tensions between education and childcare. 'I have enormous concerns about the number of four-year-olds in reception classes who are not receiving their nursery entitlement,' she said. 'Also the number of childcare places in poorer areas has not gone up, and Government statistics suggest there may even have been a decline in the number of places in some areas.'
Eva Lloyd, chief executive of the National Early Years Network, said that for the Government's early years policies to work, it needed to address the factors that influence young children's quality of life, such as housing, transport and poverty.
'The Government may not be able to meet the targets set out in its National Childcare Strategy if it pursues its current funding policies. While we await the result of the Comprehensive Spending Review with trepidation, the early years sector still badly needs a period of consolidation.'
Daycare Trust director Stephen Burke said, 'The first-ever National Childcare Strategy, launched in May 1998, was committed to delivering more high-quality, affordable childcare for children and families than ever before. Four years later, much progress has been made. Childcare is high up the political agenda and the Government continues to spend and invest substantial sums. Yet the progress that has been made in improving childcare is clearer to policymakers than parents. Only a tiny number of British families are feeling any real effect of the investment that is being made.'
The Kids' Clubs Network gave the Government seven out of 10 for its support for out-of-school childcare. Chief executive Anne Longfield said, 'The development of out-of-school childcare has been one of the great success stories of this Government. The programme got off to an early start with significant resources behind it and a will to make it work. Five years on there is a real difference for hundreds of thousands of parents and children.'
But she said there needed to be ongoing support for clubs in disadvantaged areas, more access to shared resources, more training and more playworkers.
, and more start-up funds to create additional new places.
Wraparound care is fine for older children, but under-fives need a secure, stable environment where they can have one-to-one interaction with a keyworker.'
Mrs Murphy pointed out that while the rest of Western Europe made a fundamental distinction between early years care and formal schooling, 'the UK is being taken in precisely the opposite direction by Labour'.
'The Government should have invested more in nursery schools. Instead it has made it more difficult for many of them to survive, despite a belated initiative.'
She added, 'When New Labour came to power the Network was very excited with the Government's vigour as it set about tackling the issue of early years provision, but progress in these other areas has not been as fast as we would have hoped. There is still a lot of major infrastructure change to be made.
'There is still only one childcare place for every seven children under eight and British parents are typically paying at least 6,200 a year for childcare with many paying much more. The National Childcare Strategy in its present form has delivered all it can. Without a core of sustained public funding, universal childcare will never happen.
'It's time to place childcare within the context of an integrated public service that is pluralistically delivered and financed within a comprehensive strategic Government framework.'
