UK childcare policies failing poor families, report finds
The Guardian | Education | Sally Weale | Wednesday 27 January 2016
The government’s main childcare policies are fragmented, uneven and failing to deliver for families in poverty, according to a new report.
The study by the Family and Childcare Trust (Fact) says that from next year £7.2bn of public funding – which constitutes 0.48% of GDP – will be allocated to childcare spending, yet evidence shows that low-income families are still losing out.
It calls on the government to come up with a 10-year strategy to transform childcare services, with the focus on delivering high quality childcare to the most deprived families.
The comprehensive report, entitled Creating an Anti-Poverty Childcare System and funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, says children at risk of poverty rarely have consistent access to high quality early years care, despite evidence that this improves outcomes.
It also says the system of support with childcare costs is bureaucratic and difficult for parents to navigate, and fails to adequately support them in training or education, both of which would provide a route out of poverty.
One of the government’s key election pledges was to extend free childcare to 30 hours a week for three- and four-year-olds. But according to the report, under the current system half of the most disadvantaged two-year-olds do not receive their free entitlement to childcare in a setting led by an early years graduate, a key quality indicator.
