General election: Focus on quality childcare, not just more 'free' hours, parties told
Fiona Simpson
Wednesday, November 27, 2019
Political parties must offer high-quality funded childcare rather than focus on the number of hours available in order to improve child development, researchers have said.
A new election brief produced by the London School of Economics says “only high-quality provision has a measurable effect on [developmental] outcomes”.
“Spending more months receiving early education substantially improves child development only when the child attends an Ofsted rated ‘Outstanding’ setting,” researchers at the university’s Centre for Economic Performance said.
The outcome raised concerns over social mobility, suggesting “disadvantaged families struggle to access high-quality provision”.
It said: “Children from disadvantaged backgrounds are already behind when they start school and achievement gaps continue to grow throughout school, making a substantial contribution to the low intergenerational mobility in the UK.
“Early education has the potential to change this by helping to improve child development and enabling children to start school on a more level playing field.”
The Early Years Alliance said recent childcare policies “clearly benefit more affluent families”.
In the run up to the 12 December election, Labour has pledged £4.5bn to provide full-time funded early education to two-, three-and four-year-olds regardless of income.
The Liberal Democrats promised to provide 35 hours of funded early education to two-, three- and four-year-olds regardless of family income 48 weeks per year
The Conservative manifesto vows to spend £1bn on providing childcare including before and after school and during school holidays.
The LSE researchers analysed the roll-out of 12.5 hours’ funded education by the Labour Party between 1997 and 2010 and later the increase of this to 15 hours under the coalition Government in 2010.
They found “past expansions of early years provision have not been very successful in improving children’s development.”
This was because “most children were attending similar provision before it became government funded, so their ability to access early education did not change much,” the report said.
LSE has called on the main parties to make child development a focus of childcare policies as well as supporting mothers to go back to work and easing financial pressures for working parents.
Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Early Years Alliance, said despite most childcare provisions being rated “good” or “outstanding” by Ofsted “the continued delivery of high-quality provision is almost impossible”.
This is due to the “scale of underfunding and the challenges it creates, especially in the recruitment and retention of staff and the accessibility of places in deprived areas,” he said.
Mr Leitch said the next government “urgently need to decide what childcare is for in this country”.
“You’d be hard pressed to argue that most ‘free’ entitlements were designed to encourage child development, particularly when they fail to target those children who really need support and, like other recent childcare policies, clearly benefits more affluent families.
“If the next government is serious about child development, then they need to think beyond what works at the ballot box and start putting our youngest children first. That doesn’t just mean increasing funding levels, it also means being certain about the support they’re offering and how it targets those who need it most,” he added.
