Feeling a bit swindled by talk of 'free' nursery places!

[Piffy]

Is it just me? Have just actually looked into the reality behind the 'free' nursery sessions once kids are three, to find it is actually about £500 per term - way less than I pay for just one month!

How exactly is that supposed to encourage parents back into work? I suppose every little helps, but really isn't it just a huge gyp? Surely the govt know that the chances of most day nurseries charging less than £8 per session is so remote as to be impossible?

[bonkerz]

the FREE SESSIONS only actually mean you get 5 x 2.5 hour sessions per week! You cannot use all these sessions in one day either so if your child does 8-5 in nursery you can only use 2 sessions per day. It does make a difference to your bill but doesnt exaclty mean its free!!!

[bobsmum]

My nursery charges £2.50 - £3.00 a session, but then it's a council nursery.

[Bubble99]

I'm a nursery owner Piffy and yes, this is a major problem.

I think the problems arise as, at state nurseries, children are currently offered a 2.5 morning or afternoon session without any money ever changing hands. This provision is useless for working parents (unless they have a job for 2.5 hours daily, including travelling time.)

Also, the 2.5 hours offer is only for term time.

At the moment in our area the grant per term is £452.75. This works out at £2.52 per hour for term time only. If you need a full time place you get no grant at all for out of term time.

What P's me off is that the government acknowledges that a Sure Start nursery place costs £6.30 an hour but we are expected and asked to provide the same service for £2.52 per hour. This is, in part, due to Sure Start nurseries offering their staff salaries well above market rate, which will be another nail in the coffin for small nursery businesses. We cannot offer the same salaries without increasing our prices so much that we will go under.

How are we supposed to provide good quality care for £2.52 an hour? This doesn't even cover our overheads, let alone allowing us to make some kind of profit.

[beckybrastraps]

It isn't about getting parents to work. Well, the Nusery Education funding isn't anyway. It's about providing a nursery education for preschool children.

[Bubble99]

I wish the govt. would drop the '2.5 hours' (soon to be increased to 3 hours) thing TBH as it is misleading. It would be better to say that either you can receive 2.5/3 hours free nursery education in a state run sessional nursery or you can receive a grant of X amount per year (forget this 'term time' stuff, it doesn't apply to parents who WOTH) to be paid towards your private nursery fees.

We are providing pre-school education as required and inspected by both OFSTED and our local council's Early Years department.