Daily roundup: Academies accusations, Salford childcare, and CYP Now signs off for 2012

This is the last daily bulletin of the year. The CYP Now team wishes you a merry Christmas. The next daily bulletin will be published on 3 January 2013.

Department for Education staff are making money out of the academies programme, the National Union of Teachers (NUT) has claimed. The union says it has evidence that a number of education advisors working for the DfE as academy brokers and on other academy or free school-related activities are linked to academy chains or sponsors. “It is quite unacceptable that a number of people are making a lot of money out of work within the DfE that is solely driven by the government’s obsession with turning more and more schools into academies,” said Christine Blower, NUT general secretary. “Michael Gove should terminate these contracts, call a halt to the forced academy programme and return to the DfE its function of supporting all schools, whatever their status.”

Salford City Council has pledged to give all three- and four-year-olds 25 hours of free nursery care a week. More than 2,000 children will benefit from the £2m scheme, which exceeds the national entitlement of 15 hours a week. The council claims Salford is the only city offering the support, which is being delivered in partnership with local schools. “It means every three- and four-year-old at a school nursery will be guaranteed 25 hours a week so that they can get the best possible start in life,” said Salford’s mayor Ian Stewart. “It will also potentially open up new job opportunities for their parents and families at a time of recession when people are struggling to make ends meet.”