Holiday camps cancelled- what are key workers supposed to do?

[Dishwashersaurous]

My children’s holiday camp provider has just emailed to say that despite thinking that they were going to run, they have been told by department for education that they cannot run.
I booked these days in September.

I understand that if dfe say that they cannot run then they cannot.

But my aibu is what am I , and millions of other parents, supposed to ?

We’ve been just about coping but I was clinging on to the summer camps to enable us both to work normally.

Grandparents are not legally allowed in the house.
No where is open.
I can’t take anymore leave/ unpaid leave etc, nor can my husband as it’s been used up in the crisis so far.

@Hmmph

Isn’t the plan that parents (mother’s mostly) won’t be able to work, and will be forced to quit their jobs and become Sahp. For a proportion of these, they can’t then claim benefits as household income from partner is too high. This improves employment statistics as these (women) forced from the work place don’t show up and others (men) can take up their jobs.

Or maybe I’m just cynical.

I think this just about sums it up.

Update just now from The Out of School Alliance. Holiday clubs cannot go ahead

www.outofschoolalliance.co.uk/holiday-clubs-covid19

@Hmmph

We have split our annual leave between us, planned in one week where I will wfh and the kids will be glued to screens , another week my lovely mum has rented a 'lodge' just up the road from her and will take them out in the day in chunks only works if holiday rental are allowed by then . Then two weeks we have some paid for childcare being provided by a young adult (almost all our neighbours Uni student kids are back home, so you could ask around) who will take them to the park/anything that's open or entertain them in a different part of the house.. So basically the usual cobble together with added creative thinking/risk of it going to shit if we face added restrictions.

[quote SandieCheeks]@HGTY1350 currently they can’t open, but the summer holidays are still over a month away.[/quote]
Very true i guess some will continue taking our bookings in the hope it changes. I assume they wont be able to be insured currently either if its against Gov guidance?

This thread makes me feel so angry on behalf of parents who are trying to work.
I am fortunately not in that position as my DC are now adults, but as a parent who worked, I well know the difficulties of arranging childcare for the holidays, without all the Covid19 stuff. Horrendously difficult at the best of times, and looking back, I remember my DH and I having staggered holidays, and using relatives, holiday clubs etc.
If you have any relatives at all that you could could use, then I would, regardless of any Social Distancing rules (unless said relative is shielding, etc).
The only other option I can suggest, is to find someone local (another parent maybe), who would be willing to share with you. This may be breaking 'the rules' somewhat, but what else can you do?

I am starting a new job in July so won't be able to take any leave; grandparent cares for her DH so can't do it, DC is autistic so teenagers or inexperienced carers are out... wtf are we supposed to do? Do I not start my new job? So angry now

@Paddingtonthebear that statement just about sums it up, doesn't it?

Batshit. The government is so out of touch with reality.

It seems ideal for a Mumsnet campaign to government. Give children an education by opening up schools properly in September and get holiday childcare open.

We're both keyworkers but lucky, in that we can both take a fortnight of leave (although none spare to have some time off together). Plus DH's work offers a 4-midnight shift which is pretty unpopular, and so for the remaining fortnight I'll go in early and he'll do 4-12. It's a bit shit as there's no family time, but at least we're covered.

Much though I dislike the Gov, this is just part of a much wider problem - basically you can't have strict social distancing in every aspect of life AND a remotely functional society. Its just not possible. And I really just fucking wish we would accept its not possible

@drspouse

You can only have a student or teen over if you know and trust them. I don't know any older teens at all. Which is why when we employed students as babysitters we got references, rang them up and chatted to them, and their DBS checks. Though we do also have a babysitter who was DS' TA and obviously we knew him.

A childminder would have even less space for distancing than a school or community hall.
You do know THAT SCHOOLS ARE NOT SOCIALLY DISTANCING.

Both my children’s schools are SOCIALLY DISTANCING

This is honestly ridiculous. 4th July! We break up on the 10th. Just wtf.

Can't have a nanny, childcare for us needs to be out of the home. On wfh days I'm dealing with sensitive calls and data, just not appropriate for a child to be here.

Been on waiting lists for the 3 childminders who cover my area for years. I was hoping schools would have to put on some provision for key worker children like they did over Easter?!

[quote Paddingtonthebear]Update just now from The Out of School Alliance. Holiday clubs cannot go ahead

www.outofschoolalliance.co.uk/holiday-clubs-covid19[/quote]
It doesn’t say they can’t go ahead, it says they are working on it:
they are working to produce a set of guidance that will set out how (or even if) holiday clubs will be able to open this summer

The link just above is right when it says:-

"It seems inexplicable to us that a club which is Ofsted-registered, and therefore subject to external oversight and accustomed to following strict regulations, cannot be issued with a series of conditions that it will need to meet in order to be able to open at the start of the summer holidays. (Obviously if external conditions change (eg a spike in new Covid-19 cases) then further re-opening of childcare settings might have to be postponed.) We have asked whether an indication of the guidelines could be released now, so that clubs could at least start to look into whether they would be able to meet them, but the representatives of the DfE were not able to agree to this suggestion."

Juan if you have a door that locks you could work with childcare inthe house probably? I have done that as a lawyer since 1994 with very very confidential material. I have always had a door that can be locked and my work is mostly email but if I were talking no one could hear in other rooms as I use a landline and not speaker phone and my office is off the hallway and the when very small children with their daily nanny would be in a separate room which also had a lock at the top to stop the toddlers leaving the room to find me. However I accept some people work in a one room studio or only have 2 rooms and you can hear everything in every room.

Yes Graciebobcat

Another update from Out of School Alliance

“And our 'cautious optimism' about there being a prompt revision to the sudden rule about clubs being able to operate on school sites was also misplaced. Despite assurances that there would be an urgent review, and hints and almost promises that there would be an announcement last week, and then that it would be early this week, it seems that issue of clubs operating off school sites has now become entangled in the bigger issue of holiday clubs re-opening. So any changes to the initial ruling will now have to wait until the whole holiday club issue is resolved.“

So at the moment, until there is a change from the government, no holiday clubs are permitted.

@xenia we're in a house but not a big one at all. If I'm say upstairs and DH is wfh downstairs then my daughter would be really limited to where she could go. I don't think it is fair on her to be trapped in one room for 6 weeks with no interaction with other children either. It is just shit.

Mine's elderly grandparents cannot cope with them for long, they are very difficult behavior wise, eldest is sensitive and has constant meltdowns. The other GP's (along with their useless dad) are 100 miles North.

So that's me not working all summer again, tearing my hair out with the lack of breaks I get and their difficult behaviour... and scraping by.

Just feel lucky I get the meal vouchers and get to rest up now (both are back FT for now under the vulnerable category -ie mum had a breakdown category) before it all starts again.

Has anyone realised none of the ministers have experience for their own jobs Lack of parenting and general life as the least of their inadequacies.

Shouldn't people with experience in their field be the ministers?

Instead we have Gavin William, the current education minister.
Secretary State for Defence
Chief Whip
Went to Uni to study politics (how very original)

Matt Hancock Current Secretary for Health and Social Care
Secretary to state for Digital, culture, Media and Sport
Ba in Philosophy, Politics, Economics
MPhil in Economics

Ok one of them is married to someone in education. That's it. If I walked in off the street to apply for one of these posts, I'd be laughed out of the office. Although how do we apply for these cabinet roles? Instead we have endless PM's giving key roles to anyone it seems.

We can’t run as, even if allowed, as we don’t have the staff to split across three sites safely.

We could do it in one school and keep the children in their existing school bubbles if we could hire extra space in the school, but that won’t be allowed as the school won’t (understandably) hire out classrooms as they’ll be organising them for September. I won’t have two staff alone in a building with children.

We were planning opening with 5 keyworker bubbles with 2 staff each plus 2 staff not in any bubble so they could step in in emergency. The bubbles would have had a fixed space each week, but rotated round so they all had a turn in each activity space over the break.

We’ve also been told that even if the government allowed it out council will not be allowing people to hire community spaces like community halls or theatres as their booking staff are currently redeployed so we couldn’t even look into alternative spaces if it was allowed.

To allow people to make plans we’ve had to say that we’ve had to make a decision based on current guidance and even if that changes we won’t be running. We left it as long as we could, but I can’t order equipment, supplies and food that we may not use. I don’t know yet how it’s going to go for the Easter funding that wasn’t spent how it should be (we were all organised for it so anything that wouldn’t keep was donated to the keyworker hubs)

I saw a (commercially run) summer holiday camp being advertised today - they are happening with some changes. So keep an eye out for what's happening in your area.

@cologne4711

I saw a (commercially run) summer holiday camp being advertised today - they are happening with some changes. So keep an eye out for what's happening in your area.

Being advertised doesn’t mean they’ll run

The only other holiday camp round here (who pride themselves on being “professional with paid staff” as mine is all volunteers - even though our Ofsted is considerably better) is advertising. They’ve also taken bookings from a number of people that will only be possible if the government allows them to run with no social distancing and no bubbles.

There’s no chance they’ll be allowed to do that.

A lot are, from what I can see, taking bookings in the hope of running rather than the expectation.

I think the confusion is that some Ofsted registered clubs that hire school premises and take children from different schools think they are ok to open. But it sounds like clubs can only open if they are

Posted too soon!

But it sounds like at the moment, clubs can only open if they are based at the school and only offering spaces to the children who have been attending that school in social bubbles.