‘A new era of child-centred government’. That’s what Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson declared at this year's Labour conference. This is an encouraging commitment, backed up by some solid, meaningful plans to invest in early years education and ensure better outcomes for children across the country.
But, just as in the Labour manifesto, one crucial component was overlooked: childminders.
Once upon a time, childminders were the largest provider of full-day childcare outside the home for young children. It’s not a fairytale to imagine we can return to those heights; but we have to take proactive steps to revive this vital portion of the sector. Even now, while the Government urgently needs to find 35,000 more early years practitioners, childminding barely gets a mention.
The conference’s headline childcare news was Phillipson’s £15m plan to create over 3,000 new nurseries in primary schools. It’s a significant investment at a time that demands bold solutions. Nurseries are a great option for many families, but they are also closing their doors in alarming numbers and those that remain have reported serious difficulties in hiring new staff. Adding more nurseries into the mix without addressing the workforce crisis is like pouring water into a leaky bucket and expecting the level to rise.
After years of feeling undervalued and underpaid, nursery workers are exchanging early years roles for those that offer fairer wages and command more respect. Childminders, too, have left the sector in large numbers; 50 per cent disappeared between 2013 and 2023.
Yet, childminding has a unique potential to be a truly future-proofed profession. It’s based on personal, community connections and allows educators to work from home (a perk that an estimated 53 per cent of job seekers are searching for). On top of this, tiney childminders earn more than £20 an hour on average – more than double the average nursery worker's salary. Furthermore, there is increasing evidence that childminders provide the best environment for supporting brain development in children during their first 1,000 days.
We need to do more to promote this incredible career. That requires significant cultural and systemic changes around how we view all early years roles, which takes time. But families need childcare solutions now. Across the country, nurseries have reported several-year waiting lists, and an estimated
£9.4b in earnings are lost from the UK’s GDP when parents, primarily mothers, cannot return to work due to lack of available childcare. No one could accuse the government of not thinking big with the nursery model, but why not think even bigger with childminders?
They are well-trained and regulated, deliver excellent early years education through the EYFS curriculum, have lower overheads, can provide wraparound care, and are able to operate in low-income areas or more remote areas that nurseries can’t always reach. By giving childminding the attention it deserves in its early years strategy, the government can begin to fill the gaps and provide some immediate relief.
We have seen this strategy work before. There are more than 200,000 childminders operating in France, who have slashed childcare costs for French families (childcare eats up about a quarter of parents’ income in the UK versus just 12 per cent in France). At the turn of the century, there were over 100,000 in England - there are now less than 25,000. This is not a reason for Labour to abandon this path. Instead, it should be a call to be bold to turn this crisis around.
Common sense reforms which provide the right level of support for childminders, while also raising standards could make childminding an even more rewarding career and invite more passionate and qualified early years educators into the field. The best part is that childminding reforms are a relatively inexpensive solution. This is an important consideration, especially given that later this month, Rachel Reeves’ Autumn budget is expected to pour more money into nurseries, likely sidestepping childminding altogether.
Building a country where children come first – as Phillipson is rightly striving for – requires putting people who have made it their livelihood to care for children high up on the agenda. That must include childminders.
A logical first step would be for the Government to set a target that 50 per cent of the 40,000 new recruits needed should be childminders. That would send a clear signal that they intend to use all available resources to end the childcare crisis. With a comprehensive government strategy and focus in place, there is no reason why childminding can’t expand rapidly to meet the mark.
