AIBU to feel annoyed about ‘free childcare’

It's so frustrating isn't it, we are in a similar situation here.

My little one turned 3 in January, only eligible for the 15 hours funding from April, stretched over the year so they've averaged it to something like 8.9 funded hours per week.
Then with the fee increase on top I'm actually paying more for my monthly bill going forward than I was before we were entitled to any funded hours.
I appreciate I earn well (just over 100k) but I have worked very hard for that, obviously never been eligible for child benefit or tax free childcare etc and that's fine but it pisses me off when the government acts like it's doing us all a favour and these 15 hours are universal when actually it's costing me more!

Another example of Tory gaslighting.

Our nursery has opted out as they say it's not financially viable for them to offer the 15 hrs for 2 year olds. Plus from 1 April they had a fee increase so I'm actually paying more now than last month 🤷‍♀️ It's so frustrating.

my son started a new nursery today, because his old one has shut due to the pressure of the funding coming in, and the cost of recruiting and retaining staff. The staff they did have had in most cases been there years and they were in bits on the last day.

I have some insight from the inside too, because while I’m waiting for a new job to start I’ve been temping in a nursery myself. Nurseries currently can’t survive without a temp workforce in most cases. I, as an unqualified (experienced, as I am a nanny, and degree educated in a relevant field, but no official level 2/3/4 in childcare) temp am on £13 an hour, which is still shocking really. But, the qualified room leaders on the permanent payroll are on LESS than this, at about £12 an hour. It’s not right, it’s not fair, and until the childcare sector is valued and funded accordingly this will remain the case. It’s no wonder they attract a lot of young girls using it as a stop gap, or going into it wanting a career but finding that the hours are long, the pay is crap, the admin you’re expected to do on top of childcare duties is ridiculous and it’s not likely to get any better. They leave in droves, which is why today, half the staff at the nursery are drafted in temps.

My DS just turned 2. Nursery hiked all fees hugely in Jan, I assume to cover the new free hours coming in. Between the fee hike and his ‘free hours’ I’m £90 a month better off for his full time spot now relative to Dec 2023. £90 is better than nothing, don’t get me wrong, but it would hardly be helping me back to work if I wasn’t already.

This parent blaming has to stop. My child’s (under 2) full time nursery place costs £19,500 a year. 15 years ago the average nursery bill was less than £5k p.a. The average family can’t afford £20k a year in childcare, so yes, it needs to be subsidised or the whole system needs to be replaced. The parents claiming the funded hours are working (that’s a criteria of the funding) and so therefore paying tax. The children will also grow up to work and pay tax. We have a declining birth rate in the country and people are outraged that the tax payers are funding a small proportion of (extortionate) childcare, it defies belief.

But it costs the taxpayers NOTHING. Encouraging women back into the workforce by giving them a reduced-cost childcare provision pays for itself in increased taxes paid by those women. Take a career break to look after kids and tot up how much that affects your lifetime earnings. Then look at the tax you would have paid had you earned that higher amount. Then compare to how much the government spend on funding childcare. It pays for itself.

In a lot of parts of the country if you work full time earning an average salary with 2 kids and no subsidised childcare you earn nothing. It all goes on nursery fees. I think it’s scandalous. Don’t we value these average salary workers at all?

It’s not free!! It’s funded. And it’s partially funded. It’s not enough to cover costs.

Good question.
Apparently, the tax payer.

Its not the government who pays though - its tax payers who pay.

Shame you had to resort to name calling in response to a reasonable question.

BTW you have a go at me too - I support good quality affordable childcare provision. Good quality childcare is not just good for the economy but its also excellent for children's development.

I never got to benefit from this at all as when the Scottish government introduced "free childcare" there wasn't actually enough provision for most children to get a space. I had to carry on paying for private nursery. It was a great gimmick for the SNP to bang on about free childcare but hardly anyone got it.

First of all it’s not free childcare hours.
It has to be paid for somehow.
Nurseries aren’t getting the funding from the govt to cover it properly so they’ve to see to recoup the costs somewhere.
Funded childcare places unfortunately are being funded by parents via other means but hey ho the govt can chirp and boast that they’ve given so many funded childcare places but they fail to mention how little funding they’ve provided for this and what the knock on effects are

But you dont pay for the food, it's just a thing to put on the invoice as they need the money to run the nursery, but can't charge you for it legally.

The really disgusting thin is people like Gillian Keegan saying- oh nurseries have enough resources, enough people, this works. IT DOESNT!
Nurseries are not getting enough money to offer 15/30h free hours to parents, so add on costs to make up for this. I pay 30% of usual fees for the 'free' day, and I read what nurseries do is not exactly legal, but on hte other hand if they go bust there wont be any childcare to use, so I am happy to pay as it's still a bit of money saved.

I'm also shocked at the £15 for food...

15 pound a day for 3 meals plus snacks.. cooked and cleaned by someone else...sounds like pretty good value to me

Not really, we get the free hours here and definitely not wealthy - combined household income 35k - and not on benefits.

People make a choice to live a more materialistic lifestyle and therefore work more hours.

If you want to have cars, holidays, smart phones, hairdresser appointments, TV subscriptions, new clothes, new furniture, you will have to work more hours.

People I know who use childcare for under 2s are all relatively well off (otherwise they wouldn't be able to afford it)

It is Tory sound bites with out any substance.

Not ‘free’ at all.

15 pounds a day for food...are they deliverooing his meal?

That’s nurseries for you! I don’t have to pay fees when my son’s childminder is shut for bank holidays and she charges me £2 a day for his lunch (I send his breakfast and tea). We’ve saved quite a bit this month with his 15 free hours, he does only go 3 days but I’m pretty happy.

Surely you mean 'other taxpayers', rather than 'the government'? No such thing as government money.

I am not convinced that it is best for the government to decide what my money is spent on. If I kept more of my own hard-earned money, then I could make my own choice about whether to work or stay home.

They've made it so only the following classes can have afford to have children:

>the very wealthy
>benefit users

Nothing for those in between.

Mine is free. The nursery is only open term time 9-3.30 but within that you can whatever combinations of full or half days or 30 minute lunch times you want, up to the 15 or 30 hours. You have to provide a packed lunch.

The problem is 8-6 52 week nurseries don't fit the pattern very well. That would be 2600 hours childcare whereas the 15 free hours only adds up to 555 hours. So it would only ever be a 20% reduction. Plus of course it doesn't cover food and nappies. Most 8-6 nurseries provide 3 meals a day plus snacks. They need to run a kitchen to do that which costs money. A child can't really eat 3 meals a day of packed lunch 5 days a week.
Children in a 9-3.30 nursery eat their breakfast and tea at home so.it doesn't matter if lunch is a sandwich and bag of party rings every day. Or if they go to breakfast and after-school club it ends up costing much the same as a 8-6 nursery due to the extra hours and food.

People are expecting too much from the state here. Once the child is school age you will have to pay for breakfast and tea and wrap around care and holiday care if you use them so why should it be free for pre school age children?

@Autienotnaughtie I guess that's the same as UC, though - up to 85% back, if you're eligible. Just a lot fewer people are than were on TCs.

It's the marketing of it as "free" that's the problem. It was never free, and a lot of people don't seem to have picked up on that.

My bill has halved; because DS only goes two days a week, so most of his is now funded - but new starters now pay £12 a day more, and there's a funded charge of £10 per day when you use free hours. If I add an extra day, my fees shoot up to higher than they were before.

Although it has to be working for people, because nursery waiting lists have gone mad. We looked at an alternative nursery yesterday, and they offered us a start date of September 2026. He'll be in school then! It's just not free. It's cheaper.

When we were viewing nurseries last year, one charged £54 and said they wouldn't be able to offer much of a reduction with TFC. One was £85. One was £92. I suppose the higher profit margins ones have more space to play, although standards there have dropped as a result of the new free hours, that's been really clear.

Legally nurseries have to offer the funding completely free. The top up is a contribution you can opt out of. So if you provide your own food, crafts , nappies etc u don't pay the top up.

The reality is if everyone did this nurseries would shut.

They can offer the hours as they want though, and additional hours do need to be paid for.

When my kids were little it was the tax credits system so if you were entitled to help you could get upto 90% of childcare paid. This was at what ever rate the nursery/childminder chose to charge. It was means tested. It was a fairer system for the nurseries as they were properly paid , the only down side was it was paid to parents so some parents would spend it and plead poverty (I worked in childcare at tge time)