The government has published guidelines for local authorities to ensure that funding for free early years provision is distributed fairly and transparently.
It is intended to help authorities implement the Early Years Single Funding Formula, which every local authority should be using from next April.
The formula will inform the way local authorities distribute funding to deliver the free entitlement to early years provision for three- and four-year-olds.
Until now funding for the free places has been distributed via schools forums, where council-run nurseries are better represented than the private, voluntary and independent (PVI) sector, which has complained that it has missed out.
The formula is designed to ensure that councils apply the same criteria when distributing funds to all nurseries, whether they are council-run or PVI. It will also guarantee that funding is based on the actual cost of delivering the free places, rather than the costs predicted by nurseries.
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