30 hours for 1.5 year olds and over expected tomorroe

[QforCucumber]

As per the attached! This would help people so much

By the way, the LADO is also part of children’s services and has nothing whatsoever to do with early years funding.

As I said, locality based. My LA and at least two neighbouring LA’s do have EY teams, including safeguarding, families information service, strategic place planning and EY advisory staff/ advanced teachers.
These are to help support, develop and maintain the safety and standards for our youngest children.
Budgets from central government are slashed in all areas. I would be very fearful if LA’s we're not prioritising the safety and quality of our youngest children through the little money that they can retain.

Surely you feel the same, that this is a huge priority.

I really don’t understand the argument you are making here.

Of course safeguarding has to be a priority. I get that and I agree with you. But the early years childcare funding is not allocated to any part of the children’s social care budget in my borough and I’m sure this is the case everywhere. The percentage of the childcare funding that is skimmed off does fund what used to be the family information service - where parents get a list of the providers in their area. I think they also get information about various courses from this service - all of which seem to be free for them. The few courses they offer for childcare providers (all of them run by ex-LA employees) are not free, and in fact, are charged at a much higher rate than elsewhere. The whole thing is rotten to the core.

I take it you work for one of these early years departments in some capacity. Fine, but let’s not pretend they are necessary because they’re not. In fact, I raised a safeguarding concern with one of the early years team at my L.A. once and was told in no uncertain terms that safeguarding was nothing to do with them and that I needed to take my concern to the front door team. Early years maintain the list of child care providers and give out information about courses. That’s what their percentage of the funding pays for and it’s an egregious waste of public money. The information could be put into a government website and maintained centrally at a fraction of the cost.

I think you express a very limited view of LA budgets and priorities and are sharing incorrect information.

Unless you are a Finance Director within an LA, you won't have any idea of the funding streams and how these need to be used and shared to support council services. Some of the EY funding supports the funding towards the LADO, for instance.

No, I don't work for an LA EY team but do have knowledge of LA funding streams, priorities and LA Statutory Duties.

But the LA publish the information showing how the money is allocated. The early years department also has meetings with providers setting out pound for pound how the money is allocated. It does not pay for the LADO or for any other part of children’s social care - it pays for the early years team and the family information service.

If local authorities are siphoning off part of the early years CHILDCARE budget and adding it to the children’s social care budget, that is outrageous and central government should investigate it and put a stop to it. Children’s social care gets their own funding direct from central government. The money that is allocated for childcare should be used for childcare, end of.

I'll leave it now as I keep saying the same....locality based and your opinions are NOT representative of ALL LA’s.

I think we now agree that LA’s do need to take a cut of the money provided by central government so that children are kept safe, which isn't quite where you started with your view of cutting out LA’s completely.

I absolutely do not think that.

All LA departments have their own funding, including and especially children’s social care. Why should the money that has been designated for childcare funding be used to top up the children’s social care funding? You may as well say that a percentage of money designated for road safety should be allocated to children’s social care.

It’s not the case anyway, unless the councils are shifting around the money on the sly. They all publish information showing how funds are allocated, so they are certainly not being upfront about it if they do.