The first few schemes in the two-year pilot are due to launch nextmonth.
All are expected to be up and running by September. The plan wasoriginally announced in spring 2004 but has only just been finalised,and it was feared that the scheme had been dropped.
However, Children Now has discovered that the Department for Educationand Skills is set to launch the pilot in April with the aim of getting6,000 children into free childcare in the first year.
Overall, the Government hopes to reach 12,000 two-year- olds. The pilotwill focus on children in disadvantaged areas including communitieswhere take-up of free childcare for three- and four-year-olds has beenlow. It will also attempt to target families that have traditionallyfound it harder to access childcare such as those with disabled childrenand people from Black and ethnic minority communities.
The full details of the pilot have yet to be released, but the NationalChildminding Association said it was confident that childminders wouldbe involved. "The message that we've had from them is that they arealready seeing a clear anticipation from local authorities that theywant to work with childminders because they recognise that youngchildren shouldn't be entirely in a group-based setting," said LizBayram, chief executive of the National Childminding Association.
Other UK countries have also turned their attention to provision foryounger children.
Northern Ireland has just announced a 2.75m developmentalprogramme for two-year-olds, which will focus on play activities ingroup settings.
In Wales, free childcare for two-year-olds is the central plank of thenew Flying Start scheme. This also focuses on disadvantaged familiesliving in the catchment areas of schools with a high take-up of freeschool meals.
