Plans to overhaul early years “shelved”
By Rachel Lawler
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has reportedly dropped plans to change early years ratios, according to reports in The Telegraph.
Liz Truss previously considered sweeping changes to the early years, including relaxing ratios, increasing the number of funded hours offered each week and giving funding directly to parents instead of providers. These have reportedly been shelved.
A Number 10 source told The Telegraph: “Childcare and the early years are very important for the PM. He believes education is the closest we have to a silver bullet for making people’s lives better and he is working hard with ministers on improving childcare and the early years provision for the benefit of children and parents.”
"A positive thing"
Commenting, Neil Leitch, CEO of the Alliance, said: “We know that extending the so-called ‘free entitlement’ offers without significant additional investment into the early years would have placed unsustainable pressure on an already-fragile sector, and that relaxing ratios would have hugely exacerbated the current early years crisis and risked lowering quality in settings, all without saving parents a penny. As such, if reports that these proposals have been scrapped are accurate, this can only be a positive thing.
“That said, the fact that these particular policies were non-starters doesn’t mean that early years reform isn’t urgently needed. As such, it is deeply concerning to hear suggestions that the sector is set to become a lower government priority. The fact is that we currently have a system in this country where parents pay some of the highest prices in the world, while early years professionals remain undervalued and underpaid and are leaving the sector in their droves, and thousands of settings are closing each year. This simply cannot continue.
“Investment into the early years is absolutely vital to ensuring both that parents – and primarily mothers – can remain in the workforce and contribute to the economy, and that all children, regardless of background, can get the best possible start in life. If that isn’t a priority, what is?”