Sitter services are inadequate to meet demand from parents and suffer from long-term funding uncertainty, research for the Scottish Executive has found.
A study funded by the Scottish Executive found that sitter services, which offer home-based childcare from morning to evening seven days a week, have benefited parents needing childcare to allow them to work unsociable hours as well as those needing a respite from caring for disabled children. But demand has far outstripped supply.
In the report, The sitter service in Scotland: A study of the costs and benefits, researchers analysed seven services, catering for 428 families in Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Kilmar- nock, North Lanarkshire and Inverclyde. It found that waiting lists for services currently ranged from 34 per cent to 88 per cent of the total number of families they had helped in the previous year - a measure of the demand from those aware that services were available, as in many parts of Scotland they are not.
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