Twenty-one years ago, when a group of pioneering women founded Daycare Trust, childcare was seen as a family matter. The very rich had nannies, highly-paid professionals used the small number of private day nurseries. Nursery education, with its proven benefits for children, was overwhelmingly in the private sector, accessible to only a tiny minority and receiving no government subsidy.
Daycare Trust, with the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen), has just published Childcare Nation?, the first comprehensive look at childcare in England since the publication three years ago of the government's ten-year Childcare Strategy. The organisation, which still proudly bears the title of the National Childcare Campaign, is still pushing for change in this crucial area, but in a landscape transformed from that childcare desert of the 1980s.
Joint chief executive Alison Garnham says, 'Evidence clearly shows the benefits to children of good pre-school education and care, so it is a huge achievement that our nation now provides free nursery places for all three- and four-year-olds. But Childcare Nation? has a question mark in its title, because although we've made great progress in the journey towards universal, high-quality childcare for all, there are still many hurdles to be overcome.'
Free entitlement
One of the hurdles, which the media picked up on when the report was launched, is the fact that 28 per cent of parents are being asked to pay a contribution towards their free entitlement to a nursery place for their three- or four-year-old.
Daycare Trust suspects that some parents are paying because they need flexibility in the free entitlement - that is, they don't want it in five 2.5 hour sessions. Not all settings or local authorities enable parents to use their free entitlement more flexibly, although it is hoped this will be introduced from 2010.
This is a critical issue. While 95 per cent or more of all pre-school children are benefiting from free early years education, those who miss out are poorer children who need the free places most. And the fear of being charged is certainly off-putting to parents who can't afford nursery fees. Daycare Trust wants all nurseries to be obliged to advertise parents' entitlement to the free places - but it is also calling on the Government to ensure that it is adequately funded.
The report only covers the situation up to 2006, and since then a Government code of practice may have improved things. This reiterated that parents can't be charged, directly or indirectly, for the free entitlement. Future surveys may show whether parents are still being asked to pay for something that should be free.
But this problem involves making relatively small adjustments to a system that is a phenomenal success story. It is dwarfed by the much greater problems with the support system offered to parents through the tax credit system.
In spite of an expansion of childcare places, and help with costs available to large numbers of parents through the tax credits system, the proportion of mothers at work has hardly changed since the strategy began. Daycare Trust hears regularly from parents, through its information line, who cite problems in finding and paying for childcare as barriers preventing them from taking up employment opportunities.
'Two nations of childcare, one supported through supply-side funding and a massive success, the other relying on a complex mix of income-related tax credits and showing only minimal take-up from parents. That's the contrast that comes through very strongly in Childcare Nation?', says Alison Garnham. 'This needs to be sorted out, and soon, as encouraging parents into work is a key plank of the Government's strategy for ending child poverty.'
The childcare element of Working Tax Credit provides help with childcare costs of up to 80 per cent, yet for many reasons only 5 per cent of parents are currently taking this up.
'Many parents who would be eligible to receive this help are deterred either because they think tax credits are too complicated, or because they don't know about it at all,' Alison says. Parents are also frightened to apply because of stories of people being overpaid, and having the money clawed back.
Even if they get the maximum help on offer, low-income parents still often find childcare costs beyond their budget. It would make a big difference if the system could offer the poorest parents up to 100 per cent of their childcare costs.
Workforce training
Daycare Trust goes further, looking to the success of the free entitlement as a model through which the state could support parents and families in the early years.
'If we gave parents at least one year's parental leave at minimum wage or higher, and considered developing a further allowance or paid leave for the second year of a child's life, then gave all parents the right to 20 free hours of early years education and care, for 48 weeks a year for two-, three- and four-year-olds, many of the problems parents face would be solved,' says Alison.
The report brings together some of the most important research on childcare and early years education, drawing heavily on new secondary analysis of two Government data sources, the Parents' Childcare Survey and the Childcare Providers' Survey, and reinforces the message that high-quality childcare brings real benefits to children.
It also emphasises how far we still have to go in achieving a qualified workforce - and advocates going further than the Government's aspirations in this regard. Daycare Trust would like to see 100 per cent of the workforce qualified to Level 2 by 2011 and Level 3 by 2025 (minimum). Pay and status need to be improved to reflect this.
FURTHER INFORMATION
- To order a copy of Childcare Nation?, price £10, e-mail publications@daycaretrust.org.uk, or phone Ros Vidler on 020 7840 3350. A summary of the report can be downloaded from www.daycaretrust.org.uk.
SOME POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS
Child outcomes
- Research into the effects of long hours of childcare and on outcomes for the under-twos
- Investment in out-of-school activities (including financial support ensuring that all parents can take advantage of them)
Quality and the workforce
- Research into the difference in quality between the maintained and private sector - can it be explained by higher qualifications and better pay and conditions in maintained sector nurseries?
- Setting new standards for childcare workers' pay - and closing the gap in pay and status between Early Years Professionals and Qualified Teachers
Childcare provision
- Continue Government subsidy for childcare in disadvantaged areas, as this is unlikely to be sustainable otherwise
- Ensure the free entitlement is funded adequately
- More funding for out-of-school and holiday clubs, especially urgent as welfare reform proposals include requiring lone parents to work when their youngest child is 12
Maternal employment
- Look into the best way of providing care at 'atypical' hours, which are worked by 87 per cent of parents, perhaps through a national Sitter Service
Changes in patterns of childcare use
- Prioritise outreach work through children's centres and Children's Information Services, and fund it properly, to give parents the childcare information they need
- All childcare settings must be made disability-friendly. Children with SEN and disabilities are less likely to use childcare (both the free entitlement and paid-for childcare)
Childcare costs
- Find out how many families are still paying for the free entitlement
- Make help through the tax credit system cover 100 per cent of childcare costs, and consider fundamental system reform.
