Early Years free entitlement being scrutinised

Kelly

9 years ago

No way of tracking the effectiveness of the money invested in the early years free entitlement.

According to a National Audit Office report published in March, it highlights that there is no way of tracking the effectiveness of the money invested in the offering of the Early Years Free Entitlement and that the department are not getting good value for money. It is said the Public Accounts Select Committee will publish its recommendations around early summertime.

Witnesses, including Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Pre-school Learning Alliance, claimed that deprived children – the ones who should be gaining the most from the intervention – may be the least likely to benefit once settings take the full brunt of any underfunding, linked to next September’s 30 hours extension.

Reports have been issued stating that some settings are refusing families the free entitlement, this is because they cannot afford to pay for additional hours.Dalia Ben-Galim, director of policy at lone parents’ charity Gingerbread, said, ‘It’s definitely normal practice. I have case studies here that say, “My provider will only let me access the hours if I take another eight or nine hours. I can’t afford eight or nine hours because my ex-partner isn’t paying any child maintenance I can’t make that work.”’For families who are being denied the free entitlement, this means they are unable to go to work or access further training to help them return to work.

For nurseries offering the free entitlement this can be just as difficult, by offering children the free entitlement this can create a gap in the day where nurseries are losing income as they could be accepting another child who is paying for the full session. At the end of the day, nurseries have significant overheads to pay such as wages, rent, utility bills, etc. Therefore, many nurseries prioritise parents who can pay for the whole session.

Other issues

Different rates of pay for various counties
Difficulties in recruiting qualified staff
Lack of available spaces
Sessions not flexible to meet the needs of parents

For childcare settings which offer 3 hours sessions in the morning and 3-hour sessions in the afternoon have had to reduce the number of sessions available to parents to accommodate the offering of the 30hrs, this will however reduce the amount of children who can now access the setting.

With the GCSE requirement in place, many settings have seen a crisis in recruiting qualified staff; this is only going to get worse due to the demand in childcare places.

As we know, many three-year-olds are already accessing the 15hrs and shortly this will be increased to the 30hrs but what is happening with the amount of two-year-olds accessing funding. For some settings, there has been an increase due to more families being made aware of this funding, however for some settings it has been a slow uptake. Many nurseries that have had to employ staff to accommodate the two-year funding have found that times of the year funding drops as children turn three and then its a waiting game waiting for the younger children who are entitlement to turn two.

With very little evidence of how the effectiveness of this huge investment will be tracked, why increase the free entitlement from 15hrs to 30hrs?