Free childcare expansion based on 'outdated' funding figures, claims Alliance chief
Jess Brown
Friday, June 10, 2016
The government's expansion of free childcare is underpinned by outdated figures and "little more than guess work", the chief executive of the Pre-school Learning Alliance has said.
Speaking at the alliance's annual conference in London on Friday, Neil Leitch criticised the Department for Education for basing the funding of the 30 hours policy on data gathered in 2012, rather than evidence submitted for its cost of childcare consultation last year.
Many of the 2,000 submissions to the consultation were ignored because, according to the DfE, they didn't contain evidence to back up settings, claims.
Leitch said: "Much of the data underpinning the department's funding model, including key business costs such as staff wages, rent, mortgages, utilities, ratios and available places - they sourced, not from the 2,000 responses, but from DfE surveys published as far back as May 2012.
"So by the time the offer is rolled out in 2017 this data will be five-and-a half years out of date.
"How can you seriously base a funding rate for 2017 on business costs from 2012? Imagine going to your local bank manager to ask for a loan and, when he or she asked for your accounts, giving them paperwork from five years ago. You'd be laughed out of their offices. And yet the government sees fit to describe such figures as a ‘sound evidence base,."
Leitch also expressed concerns over how the 30 hours of free childcare for three- and four-year-olds is to be rolled out. He said a lot of decisions on how the eight areas piloting the policy have been "based on little more than guess work" from the DfE.
Leitch said the recent U-turn by the department on its plans to fund the first and second 15 hours of the 30-hours pilot at two different rates highlighted the problem with decision making.
"I can't help but feel a sense of ad-libbing, of making it up as we go along on this, and for a scheme this important, that's just not good enough," he said. "Providers deserve better, the children and families we support deserve better."
He added that the sector is facing the prospect of a new funding mechanism being introduced next year "that is completely untested".
"Even more worrying, whatever the government decides to fund the pilots [at] may be completely different from how it will work when the scheme is rolled out," he said.
"The DfE admitted that the trial funding approach was not a reflection of the final funding rate providers will get."
Many settings are also concerned that there will be increased demand for childcare when the 30 hours is introduced. The DfE has said capacity won't be affected, but Leitch said there isn't "a shred of evidence" to back up this claim.
The 30 hours is due to be available England-wide by September 2017.
