Ofsted extends third-party early years inspection contracts
Jess Brown
Wednesday, June 10, 2015
Ofsted will continue to outsource the vast majority of its early years inspection work despite opposition from providers, it has emerged.
Ofsted's annual report for 2014/15, published yesterday, reveals that existing contracts with third-party providers Tribal Group, Prospects Services and Serco Education, have been extended by a period of 18 months.
“We have extended our current contracts with our early years inspection service providers to March 2017," the document states.
The announcement comes despite early years providers calling for the contracts, which were due to expire in September 2015, to be brought back in-house.
Providers have previously raised concerns about the consistency and quality of inspections carried out by third-party providers, which account for more than 90 per cent of Ofsted’s early years inspections.
Ofsted brought the management of its school and further education inspections back in-house last year, which led to accusations that the inspectorate was treating early years providers as “second-class services”.
Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Pre-school Learning Alliance, said Ofsted's decision to extend its contracts was disappointing in light of concerns previously raised.
He said it was a “missed opportunity to make a change that would have helped improve confidence in the fairness and consistency of early years inspections.”
“Ofsted’s previous defence of the decision to continue outsourcing early years inspections – that it would be ‘unsettling’ to make any changes before the inspection cycle ends in 2016 and while the details of childminder agencies were still be finalised – no longer applies,” he said.
An Ofsted spokesman said: “We are confident that our providers will, working within the same inspection framework, continue to provide a high-quality service and help raise standards for young children in nurseries and other early years settings.”
Ofsted’s report also reveals that there were 1,062 complaints from early years providers and children’s centres over the last year relating to staff conduct, administrative issues and inspection judgments, compared with 1,197 in 2013/14.
