AIBU to hope the £100k cliff edge for funded nursery hours is removed?

[horchatatresleches]

News is that the education secretary is looking at nursery funding but it’s unclear if it’s to reduce or increase the support available at either the upper or lower thresholds. AIBU to hope that the harsh cliff edge which stops all nursery funding at £100k is removed or least replaced with something tapered so that people aren’t losing money for being marginally above the threshold?

But they pay for childcare if you earn £99k

Even if you both do, so you can earn 199,999.98 as a couple and still be entitled to the funding. That is clearly not right and should have been sorted years ago.

Flabbergasted that a parent can work 16 hours and get 30 hours free child care. It's madness and wrong. Should only get free childcare for the hours worked plus travel time. Mo wonder the country is on its knees.

That would be a minefield though.

For example, i finish at 3pm so i can pick my 5 year old up from school. So i finish at 3pm but i can’t pick my 2 year old up from nursery until slightly later.

I think we should have a child personal allowance (per child) to support working parents. I'd probably have it sharable between the parents, but they'd have to be married and live together.
We should support the family unit.

Just put more into your pension for a couple of years if you are just over 100k, I realise 100k now isn't what it once was in terms of take home and the lifestyle it brings, but if you are in that 100-120 bracket you have options to bring it down under 100k. You can hardly claim you are struggling with at least 1 adult earning £99,999 a year. I think people at the other end of the earning scale need more help, 30 hours funding works out as 2 days a week all year round, people in low-middle earner often doing essential jobs like nursing just can't afford childcare and end up going part-time, damaging their earning potential, long term career prospects and reducing pension contributions. High earners really don't need the help, it's the people who work in lower paid job who need more support to work. You have options to temporarily reduce your income to come in under the threshold, if you are 150k+ you really don't need the help.

You should get free childcare for the hours which the parent working the fewest hours works. So if I worked 35 hours and my husband worked 21, we’d get 21. If one of you didn’t work at all, no childcare hours should be provided. It’s ludicrous to be paying for childcare for those who stay at home. If their parenting is so bad that childcare is the only way a child can prepare for school adequately, why are children not being removed?

But it isn't 30 hours a week funded, it works out as 2 days childcare over 52 weeks!! A parent working 16 hours a week (so 2 days) would need 2 funded days a week, the nurseries around where we live fix days at 10 hours, so 8am-6pm no matter how long you actually need, so that's 20 hours over a week, if you divide your 30 hours (funding is term time only, 38 weeks) it works out as roughly 20 hours a week. Most people have some sort of commute, unless they work right outside the nursery so add this on and someone working only 8 hours is needing 9 hours plus childcare a day, which is the equivalent to 30 hours childcare when spread over 52 weeks.

There can be all kinds of reasons why they might still need care. Respite from a caring role or to get away from a sibling with additional needs to a short period.

And this is always the response on these threads. Niche cases. But in the vast majority of cases, can we agree that those who are at home all day shouldn’t be receiving childcare - when they are perfectly able to give it themselves.

Yes exactly this. My daughter fits into this category, although doesn’t have children yet. The amount of her salary going out every month is scandalous.

You are spectacularly missing the point.

A single parent earning 100k ends up with same amount of money as a couple earning about 39k each as they also receive child benefit.

The single parent is the faced with a marginal tax rate of well over 100% on the next £ they earn whereas each of the lower earners are looking at just 28% deductions on the next £ they earn.

You say that higher earners don’t need the help. That is a very naive comment. Currently higher earners are looking at huge losses if they increase income. Nobody should face a marginal tax rate of over 100%

As I explained in a previous post I was awarded 3 bonuses of 20k, 25k and 25k during the years my DS was at nursery. I had to refuse them as taking them would have made me worse off. Please explain to me how that is in anyway acceptable?

Allegedly they’re reviewing the suggestions Martin Lewis put forward; which got rid of the “£100 cliff edge” by making basing it on household income, rather than individual income.

Which is probably right, because it’d disqualify a lot more families and save a lot of money…

It's not about needing help more.

There's financially an argument that the cap is stunting the amount going into the treasury to help others...

It seems counter initiative but it may well be the case that the case is harming the poorest off by stopping others earn more.

Despite them helping the state

If they keep that at £100k the policy will be a huge turkey and be very unpopular indeed and will definitely harm the economy!

Here's my 2 cents.
I appreciate that to people on lower salaries 100k seems huge. It seems unfair for them to get support when they have money to save, invest and spend. However, I agree with posters that the system needs an overhaul.
It should be that everyone has fair access to childcare to enable them to work. There are a lot of adults in their late 20s, early 30s hit by a multitude of things and it is crippling - high taxes (even worse in Scotland), 9% student loans, higher cost of living over all from housing costs to food.
I believe we should look after the most vulnerable in society without question, to live a safely, without fear of poverty. I also believe this means we need to support our economy to help more people become net contributors to the system.
We should be proud that what ever life you are born into you have a basic access to education and health services. That there are systems to help you survive when you hit harder times.
We should get to a point where we are proud that everyone has a basic minimum. We should be in a position where we are able to empower each other to be successful.
I do believe childcare should be free full time, bar maybe consumables cost, for anyone for the hours they are returning to work for + at least discounted wrap around care. I also believe basic child care should be provided in school holidays so that parents aren't having to juggle annual leave, unpaid leave with school holidays.
I believe we should be in a position that every parent has the opportunity to manage their home life and work so that they have a choice not to be severely disadvantaged for taking time away to look after children when it comes to career progression.
Now, it's going to cost a lot. However, if more parents can make it to higher incomes through business growth, then more tax is going to be paid.
I also believe, we should stop subsidizing companies that effectively don't pay employees living wages by giving people universal credit to "top up" their take home pay. The companies should have to foot the bill or receive higher tax on profits.
And do you know what? I doesn't matter whether or not there is a cliff or a taper for the actual wealthy - because when you have enough money to not be worried about the cost of childcare, you are not putting them into the same settings. You have nannies, or exclusive, expensive nurseries attached to prep schools (and maybe that's how you "taper" it - places qualify out of being eligible for free childcare based on the upper end of fees they charge to provide those luxury services, that wouldn't be profitable to provide under the threshold) - they're not playing in the same league.
I also believe we should look to the Japanese and funding better nutritionist led food in schools and hospitals, any companies that provide core services like that should be non-profit.
A complete tangent, but I also believe those in work should get tax breaks on money they use for domestic services e.g. cleaner/gardener (basic)/housekeeping/childcare (unless universal free childcare is available) to enable more people to fund employment of others in local economies and help those people earn more and rely less on the state for basic income. Again, making more tax payers overall.

It's not illegal but it's not right that wealthy people can decrease their income by giving money away to charity and siphoning it off into other savings so they can claim what is still the end of the day government money. If poor people do that they are accused of deprivation of assets to qualify for more money. Universal credit have just finished investigating £14 (declared) in my 10 year old's bank account.

Under this government? It should definitely happen but there’s absolutely no chance a Labour Government would do that, unless you’re a public sector worker you’re well within enemy of people territory on that salary.

If rather they dealt with the unfairness of the child benefit higher tax charge which penalises single income households than one where someone earns £100k 🙄

Why would it harm the economy though? Those earning less pay less tax. If they stop work to look after kids it’s less of an issue for the government. But they won’t do that because they need the money more. It’s damages the economy more if people put the breaks on going into the £100-125k tax bracket which is taxed at 62% due to this policy.

The 62% rate isn’t to do with childcare - it’s the loss of the personal allowance.

Factoring in 30 free hours, the rate is more like 100% (or higher) between £100-125k.

Why?

It potentially means you end up with one parent earning over £100k but also encourage a second parent able to work on a low wage rather than stay home. It leaves the second low paid worker less vulnerable to financial and domestic abuse too.

Given this is affecting a lot of doctors encouraging them to work less hours rather than go over the cliff it means patients will get seen sooner if they are seen quicker because they will be more willing to do those extra shifts. That reduces the hours lost to sickness too.

There are lots of consequences to the cap that are indirect.

It isn't just about giving a hand out to people earning over a certain amount. It means there is incentive to further your career or work extra past a certain point - every £ of which you pay more tax on and rather than putting it into salary sacrifice which just stops money circulating in the economy.

If you think it's just about the number £100k and nothing beyond that you don't understand the problem and are over simplifying it. Which is a problem with policy in general - it's made up for winning votes rather than what's actually going to bring in more for the treasury in both the short and long term.

All of us who can work pay taxes and all of us “get something back”. We fund nursery places for those on lower incomes not across the board. We fund special schools for those that need those and arts and museums and education from 4 to 18 and transport for elderly and all sorts of things. I don’t think we need to fund nursery for those with much higher than average salaries.

That’s pennies compared with childcare costs and loss of personal allowance.