Expanding the 'free entitlement' to a funded childcare place to children aged two and under in working families will save the average family with a toddler using formal childcare over £80 a week. Those using full-time formal childcare, or with multiple young children, or living in London and the Southeast, are set to benefit considerably more.
Based on existing patterns of childcare use, this reform will leave Whitehall in charge of the price of 80 per cent of all pre-school childcare in England (up from just under 50 per cent now). That raises the stakes for getting the funding rate right: too low, and providers could opt out of delivering the new entitlement or even exit the market entirely. That could leave today's promises a theoretical entitlement only, and risks making it even harder for parents to find a childcare place.
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