The recommendation has come from members of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Childcare and Early Education, which is looking at the challenges childcare workers face in response to the health crisis.
They are also concerned about “long-term funding issues facing the sector that have impacted on its employees”.
The APPG says that an “urgent meaningful review is required to address” the wider impact of the health crisis and issues around pay, retention, recruitment and training.
The group said that “owners and employers in the sector want to be able to pay their staff a good wage and offer them opportunities to progress and upskill, and retain experienced and highly qualified staff, which have been proven to positively impact the attainment of children as they progress onto primary school.
“They are unable to, however, due to the ongoing funding crisis and market failure experienced by the early education sector.”
“It is crucial that we safeguard the future of this vital sector and the workforce that sustains it,” said the APPG’s chair Steve Brine, Conservative MP for Winchester.
He was speaking following a APPG meeting with practitioners this week to “constructively discuss the challenges that face the early years workforce” that has “added further weight to our calls for an independent meaningful review by government to look into ways that we can alleviate the pressures facing the workforce.”
Early years providers raised concerns last month that the sector was being denied the same support from government being offered to schools.
In October an investigation by the Early Years Alliance found that one in six English councils are not following government guidance to protect childcare providers from Covid-19 income losses.
Last week it was announced that free childcare training is being offered by the government as part of a £95m package of measures to support the UK’s recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.
