30 hours for 1.5 year olds and over expected tomorroe

[QforCucumber]

As per the attached! This would help people so much

Ratio change will have a huge impact on children with SEN. Nurseries already struggle and many refuse to take children with significant needs. There's no money to support them. With even less staff (or more children) nurseries will just not take children who require extra help. Or staff will leave because the situation is unmanageable. It's tough enough on a 1:4 when there are children with additional needs.

Well the government realised exactly this - that there are going to be fewer workers bees to keep the country afloat in 20 years time, because their parents couldn’t afford to produce more than 1, if any.

this is their ridiculous, ill-thought out solution.

Until we get the general cost of living in this country under - WAY under - control again, and ensuring that people’s salaries are high enough to mean they can afford the basics of a roof over their head, we haven’t got a cat in hell’s chance of ensuring there are enough staff to run the nurseries anyway.

Unless the government fund this fully (and this isn’t by giving a token amount per child, seemingly plucked out of mid air, as they do now), we won’t be able to entice young people to work in nurseries. The higher the ratios the less attractive it becomes. We’ll end up with the inexperienced young people barely out of year 11 who DO want to give it a try being left in charge of too many small children, with everyone almost unable to cope. The older experienced staff will do a runner as soon as they are able because they won’t be able to bear what they see.

Our poor children (small ones and teenage ones) deserve better than this.

this reminds me exactly of what is happening with high needs SEND children and the government’s inclusion policy in primary schools. They are just NOT providing the extra funding that the schools need so they can pay for the one to ones that these children need in mainstream school. So the schools have to pay for it out of their own budget. They just don’t HAVE a spare £100k lying around.

it will be exactly the same in nurseries. Schools can’t just fold if they can’t afford to run, but private nurseries can, and will.

No funding is less than settings normal rate often a lot less.

The published figures are higher than what the actual provider gets, as the LA take a skimming off that too.

For over 3s you have to earn under £100k. The trouble is it's a binary line. As soon as you earn a penny over, you have an extra 30 hours to pay for. That's about £300 a week, or £12k a year, which you are taxed on.... So it takes about £20k off your salary per child. With two kids means you can either earn £99k or if you get £101k, your salary would drop to £61k. It's fair the wealthy subsidize childcare but it's a big hit. It means, it costs me money to earn between £100k and £140k. So it's a weird system.

The trouble is the government doesn't give the nursery quite enough to cover 30 hours. Which means fees inflate for those who don't get free childcare (that's why it's so high now). Under 3s are paying extra to the nursery to subsidize over 3 free childcare. Which means nursery fees for under 1.5 will be very high and anyone over £100k in the future to make up for the underfunding of the government.

Yup!! I'm concerned about this

Hang on. Do you not get the universal 15 hours free childcare?

Our nursery already does this

It is a small amount £1-£2 an hour

Which I would obviously be more than happy to pay to keep them afloat if the government don't pay them enough if they begin the funding from an earlier age

How does this work? Maybe I missed something in my reading. Can you send me a link please?

Also, I'd like to comment that I'm pleased that people are being looked after by the government, as I'm quite socialist in my outlook. But also a bit worried this will cost us loads, high childcare costs are so high at the moment that we are all affected.

Everyone get 15 hours over 38 weeks from the term after the term in which the child turns 3 (the universal offer)

Higher earners do not get 30 funded hours even if both are working or are a single parent working family.

Ooh yes , this? www.gov.uk/help-with-childcare-costs/free-childcare-and-education-for-2-to-4-year-olds

Thanks. My child is under 3, so I hadn't realised we would be eligible. So it's 50% less costly than I imagined

You should get the 15 hours.

It will be interesting to see if the 15 hours will also apply to 1 and 2 year olds.

I think it's a great thing something is being done to support working parents, in particular those in essential jobs that often are not well / fairly paid. I just hope the nurseries are fairly paid and there is a plan to help support the increased demand.

Personally, if it's only those eligible for 30 hours and those over £100k get nothing (and not 15 hours) then there will be no change for us. I don't think this is a bad thing as we're in a very fortunate position that means we don't worry about paying the bill each month and childcare costs haven't impacted my choice to return to work or if we have more children - so not we're not the people this is intended to support.

If I was being selfish (and to be clear, I'm not) then this could potentially negatively impact us in terms of poorer care for our 18 month old with increased ratios and more difficulty finding places for any future children.

It does feel like people earning between £100-125k are really penalised and this could amplify it further, as there are so many tax / benefit implications of hitting £100k so can see OPs point. Especially if it was only one parent.

Why should I donate my money? I'm perfectly happy to pay for MY child's space at nursery, not others!

@MrsKT123 Haven't read the whole thread but just posted on the other one. Really appreciate someone thinking of people in my position. I'm coming to the end of my maternity with the DTs and childcare is going to cripple us (still have 4yo in until Sep too). I'm a band 6 nurse and the main wage earner so have no choice but to return full time. Since we found out it was DTs we resigned ourselves to using our general savings to fund it but that removes our security for emergencies like boiler break downs/car repairs etc. This is monumental for us in terms of financial security and general cost of living.

agree. I'm not sure why people complain about it. The only thing for us is my son should be entitled to the funding in September term. So not sure this new funding we can actually use before September, or it wont actually help us anything at all. :-(

Oh I see. I hadn’t realised until this thread that the 30 hours scheme was fairly recently introduced (2017) and it is crippling childcare providers due to significant underfunding. It’s hard not to see it from a personal perspective given how much we’re paying out every month. Thank you for your point.

It's a little hard to read so many posts this morning still jumping for joy about this proposal when several providers have posted in the thread saying this will be the end of them and they will be forced to close their businesses be that either as a childminder or a nursery.

I suspect sadly the very real prospect of many providers closing will be thoroughly airbrushed out of any reports on the proposal today.

Agree with this completely (I don't work in childcare) however my son is currently in pre-school, he's 2 years old and we pay for his place.

I spoke to the nursery manager earlier this year and she said if ratios are increased she will leave as its unsafe.

I think the people happy about this situation probably don't have children currently in childcare.

They are struggling in many ways, funding one of them and although great more parents will have access to 'free' childcare, it will be at the detriment to the providers.

In my area there are waiting lists for every local nursery so can't see this being beneficial to us personally, or to anyone local to me. Believe its also the case in other areas.

I really feel for the poor staff who are underpaid and work really hard, I wouldnt blame them if they left.

My partner left childcare 5 years ago, such a shame as he loved it but the pay was absolutely shocking!

The government have no idea.

Just donate the money for your child then!

You might if it ended up costing you thousands. It depends how the government does it. If people who are paid a bit more need to be charged a lot more. It could be unaffordable for those who get paid a bit more if it's implemented badly. The devil is in the details of how they can afford it.

The issue is the government calling it "X amount of hours", rather than "EY funding". As some people have already said the 30hr government funding equates to roughly £4.46p/h, the school/nursery I work at charges £15.50p/h, there's a £330 hole per eligible child, covered by those that dont currently receive funding. Most nurseries cannot afford to provide 30hrs free to all pre-schooler, increasing this to younger children will result in closure of lots of nursery.

If the government simply stated £X of early years funding per year, and then allowed nurseries to set an hourly rate that would allow them to factor the cost of rent, utilities etc. It would be a much better system.

£15.50 per hour seems ridiculously excessive.

How many staff is that? What is the nursery's rent / energy costs per month?

With super basic maths and assuming 8 full time members of staff and £10k per month rent that's still about £300k profit per year.

That's what I take a huge amount of umbrage with. My childcare settings charges £5.50 per hour. I am a trustee of one of the committees so see the books. They ain't rolling in it by any means but everyone is paid fairly and there is cash in the bank for a rainy day.

I spoke to the nursery manager earlier this year and she said if ratios are increased she will leave as its unsafe .

She won't be the only one. Unfortunately I suspect your right in that those just seeing the savings either don't currently use nurseries or childminders or are just seeing the headlines and thinking about how much they will save without looking at the bigger picture.

My DS is 3 and has not long been able to access the 30hrs and whilst it's fab that his nursery bills have reduced I'd far rather they hadn't and I wasn't extremely worried this morning that his nursery now won't be able to operate and will be forced to close.

I was never under any illusions that when he was under 3 I was helping to support the cost for the preschoolers when paying his fees but at least that meant with the money I paid I knew his nursery was just about keeping their heads above the water. Now they have no chance.

"The chancellor will promise to provide free childcare for one and two year olds"

Well that should keep him busy. He'll need a big pack of wet wipes.

It's extremely disheartening that people don't seem to understand that as providers we ultimately want to provide the very best services for parents and to provide optimum opportunities for the children but with what's to come today many settings will have to face a bleak reality of closing.

This isn't about greed it's about years of severe underfunding and continuous rising costs, providers cannot continue to subsidise the shortfall. All the gleeful parents will have a shock when they realise there are no spaces available.