To disagree with 3/4 year old children having more childcare paid for

[ReallyTired]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24199711

I feel the goverment should pay for education rather than childcare. 15 hours a week is enough to meet a child's educational needs for pre school. At a time of austerity, I feel there are bigger spending priorities. (Providing enough school places for children who are of complusory school age!)

If you choose to have chidlren then you should pay to look after them. I feel that labour's set of proposals are totally unaffordable and making the "banks" pay will damage the UK financial sector long term.

All these election bribes do not help the UK in the long term.

I totally respect that jasmine but if this is the case then it really should be the parents who are educated not the kids. 2 year olds need love attention and have very basic needs . If these are not being met then its the parents responsibility, not that of us hard working families to pay more tax to provide other people's kids with childcare whilst they sit at home doing nothing. Family support can be accessed without a 2 year old going to nursery, ie through health visitor referrals

Its not enough though Sarah. We were doing that before and its how things get missed from child abuse, to behavioural problems to speech. If we have the children in 15 hours much easier to do interventions as required, as we have them in a setting with multi agency professionals, then work with surestart family support to access help as they need it.

They also have a setting keyworker who knows the child and parents much better than the social worker as they have seen them for 15 hours every week. They can then go to Core Group meetings etc.

In the (( very deprived )) area I live in children have been entitled to free (( 9 am to 3pm )) childcare for years, it gives them a break from their lives at home.

Nurseries are even open during the holidays and targeted children are given free holiday sessions, same goes for infants / junior schools. They get free access to a lot of clubs ((brownies / jujitsu etc )) and there are some amazing youth clubs which offer a sanctuary and days out too.

I live in the boil on Satans arse tho, most of the kids that attend the young carers group are the children of addicts.......very sad.

Errr access to toys and books is a big deal.If kids don't get gross and fine motor skill experience when they should it impacts on crucial stuff further down the line such as reading and writing.

Most of our children have a wealth of toys. Its mainly interaction that they are lacking. Most of the 3 year olds I work with have expensive items such as their own nintendo dses. It goes a lot deeper than that.

sarah You do know that many of the children who are eligible for 2 year old early education are children with SN and children of disabled parents. Why don't you go and tell them that's it's wonderful they get off their arses to take their kids for those 10 hours a week? I bet that would go down a treat!

if there are children who need it due to family circumstances then assess those children and their needs and give it. you don't have to roll it out to everyone just to cover those kids and it's a dangerous attitude anyway.

if kids are that seriously neglected saying ah well at least they get a few hours in nursery in with every other 2/3 year old there. they should have a social worker and a bit of nursery should be only the tip of the iceberg of intervention.

to be honest if their parents are addicts, can't be arsed to buy toys or books and don't interact with them they need a damn site more than nursery.

Swallowedafly - They have all that available in nursery in deprived areas.

Presumably it's easier to assess those children if they're in formal settings several days a week than hidden from view at home all the time though. In very deprived areas (eg areas of very high unemployment) those children are invisible until they go to preschool/nursery settings.

Then they get seen by childcare professionals who can tell if they're unusually hungry or dirty or bruised, or behind in developmental areas such as communication.

So you might give fifty poor children EYFS provision "unnecessarily" to catch the one child whose parents really are struggling/crap.

jasmine if kids are being abused it is highly unlikely their parents will sendnthemmtoo nursery. The parents tend to hide it very well.

candy at no point in my post did I discriminate against people who are disabled and have kids. Im all for helping those people out. What I am not in favour of is giving free childcare to two year olds whos parents CHOOSE not to work when they are perfectly capable and I am not talking about SAHM who have a partner at home who earns a wage, I mean parents who neither of them work but with no physical disability or mental problem that means they cant.

*send them too

I have worked in a state provided nursery for children age one and up in a very deprived area which included giving those children a hot meal for lunch. It's all very well saying the parents should provide this that and the other for the children and that the parents should somehow be changed but that doesn't help the children. Leaving children to suffer deprivation on the basis of "why should we pay for these things while the parents don't bother" is unfair on the children concerned and ignores the fact that the adverse effects of deprivation on these children will impact on wider society in the long run. Yes the parents should provide these things for their children but if they don't then I think that the rest of us have good reason to attempt to help those children. Whether other people should be compelled to pay for such assistance through their taxes or whether it should be paid for voluntarily via charities is a separate question which could be applied to any aspect of welfare but it should go without question that society has a moral duty towards children with parents who are not able to fully provide for their children whether that is due to parental choice, lack of means or lack of knowledge. A child's worthiness of help is surely dependent on their need and not on hwo deserving the parents are deemed to be?

of course a 1yo who isn't fed needs help - not nursery though - a new home.

Agreed swallowedafly!

Taking a child into care or even being on the child protection register is extremely expensive.

Some vunerable groups of parents really struggle with the basics of childcare. They may well do a good enough job, but not a brilliant job of being a mother.

For example there was a girl in my postnatal group who had major learning difficultes and she made quite a few dangerous mistakes. Ten years ago, there was a bounty pack for four month old babies which contained a range of samples. One of the sample was a can of coca cola and the girl gave her four month old the coke in his bottle. There was no malice, she just didn't understand. She was also convinced that tomarto sauce counted as one of the five fruits and veg a day.

I feel that it is would be really sad to take away a baby just becuase the mother has a low IQ. Paying for pre school at two years old is a relatively low cost of keeping an eye on children who are boarderline of needing a social worker or a speech and langugage therapist.

This won't happen, the Government doesn't have the money and there is little public support, Labour will drop it come election time.

Sarahleanne - I have provided nursery care for 100s of addicts, dv situations, children on at risk register, children who have gone in to foster care and at age 3 cant do anything at all having had no stimulation, parents that mean well but just dont know how to parent etc.

It has made massive, massive differences. There was a scheme called the pilot scheme for 2 year olds running for the last few years. We have helped many families from that, and spotted the occasionally abuse situation. Im telling you it works.

A lot of schemes 'would work' but it's getting the funding to pay for it all. I agree with utreas, come Election Day it will be dropped , they must already be wondering how they are going to fund this idea nationally

And if parents 'mean well' but don't know how to parent then I still think parenting classes would benefit these families more than taking their children out of a crap environment for a few hours a week and sticking them back in it the rest of the time. If you teach the parents right from wrong then it will rub off on their children and long term benefits will be less neglect and more stable family lives.

That ain't gonna happen SAF. I've worked with hundreds of neglected kids and most don't even qualify for a social worker. They might need a damn sight more than free nursery but they're not going to get it. Getting a new home is certainly out of the equation. Most will just struggle on, malnourished and unloved and living in dirt and chaos to grow up and repeat the cycle. No easy answers I'm afraid.

Parenting classes only work for highly motivated, cognitively capable people who are truly ready to make a change and have support to do so. In other words, not many.

but one year olds can be adopted easily and have a good chance at a totally different life. to give up on them at one knowing what's in store is tragic.

That is true but it is what happens in reality in many cases.

"And if parents 'mean well' but don't know how to parent then I still think parenting classes would benefit these families more than taking their children out of a crap environment for a few hours a week and sticking them back in it the rest of the time."

If the parents have learning difficulties then they won't get it. Even with one to one support from a social worker they skill don't understand as the innate intelligence needed is just aint there. Giving a free pre school place to the children of parents who have low intelligence is cheaper and far kinder than taking the children into care.

There's a difference between "home life is so bad that child needs a new home and should be removed" and "home life is poor and child would benefit from extra input via nursery etc." It's just not feasible to remove every child who is in a sub-optimal home environment and it is hard to judge which children actually should be removed and whilst clearly it is got wrong sometimes, it seems right and fair to offer other support first rather than just swooping in and removing children from their parents.