CM Club - should I report yet another unregistered childminder?

[Booh]

Even though Ofsted do seem to do anything about it?

I KNOW that they are not registered, and I know that it is regular childcare for money (have heard it from the mother of the children!)

If so, anyone want to do it for me?

i am in the same situation except that it is a friend of mine that is using unregistered care and she is in social services!!! to make matters worse she refers to the person who looks after her son as a childminder.

sorry, I don't have any advice. i need some myself!

Can we report them to Surestart?

Surely if as it is illegal, somebody must be responsible to enforce it.

Ofsted are there to enforce it, but all they have done in the past is send them a letter to say 'are you childminding?' and or course the person in question just says no!

The unregistered CM is a teachers wife!

I bet she will not be declaring the income. Should report to whoever deals with that too.

It is a good point.
Who does 'police' this?
How do they police it?
How many unregistered chid carers are caught and prosecuted?

My area is rife with this too and it really irritates me.

I also think parents should be better informed about the pitfalls of using unregistered child care as most are unaware of them.

The parent in question thinks it is really great.........she is only paying £5 an hour for someone to look after her 3 preschool children!

I wonder how many parents know that they could be reported to social services for leaving their child with an unregistered carer

booh that is awful!

Is it worth telling your local FIS (new name for CIS)? Also write to Ofsted notifying them... at least then they have to keep it on record.
If they are collecting a child from school, could you notify the School Head, just to make them aware.

I know of a lady who has got away with this for years and she charges more than local registered childminders.

We reported her to Ofsted on our inspection (the inspection officer on the day also happened to be my ex tutor) Basically this lady runs a boys brigade on a thursday (and from what she told Ofsted she does this on a monday-tuesday-wednesday and friday too. ???

Anyway she was visited by Ofsted told them, no she just ran boys birgade (hmm.. With Girls, Boys from 1 to 11???) collected them from schools and worked alongside her husband.

She got away with it. Even though the Inspector Knew i would not lie about something so serious. And even had a written statement from one of the parents who had used and paid her as a chldminder.

Seems OFSTED Clamp down more on genuine good minders than they do Bad illegal ones.

Either Way, if you feel the children are at risk, Report it to Ofsted. Also report it to local social services (dont tell them you have told Ofsted though, as they will do nothing about it)

I would report it. Although I didn't know anything about how rubbish ofsted were at it until reading this thread! Surely there is somebody else who we can report people to as well? Even ofsted sending the letter out though might scare her a bit. I know it would if it were me (not that I would do it anyway mind you).

It can't do any harm to report it and somebody has to. If it doesn't work and she is still doing it, I would keep reporting her till ofsted get there arse's in gear.

It really makes me angry when I hear about unregistered CM doing this. I spent months registering, and had to turn down vacancies when my reg way delayed, now having trouble filling spaces and yet people who dont register get the children!

I would also report her to the tax man as she won't be registered as self em either and wont be paying tax.

Childminding without being registered is not actually automatically an offence like running a nursery or a preschool without being registered is. Ofsted can only prosecute someone for childminding without being registered if they have issued that person with a legal notice saying "don't mind whilst unregistered", and they are then found to be breaching this notice. Bizarre but true. Not Ofsted's fault - they don't write the laws, they just get stuck enforcing them! It's the DCSF who came up with that brilliant idea.

Sadly it's very hard to prove someone is "childminding" according to the legal definition of the term - reward seems to be the key. If they say no money is changing hands, how are you supposed to prove otherwise? Sure it's a bit suspicious if you're looking after a whole bunch of kids purely from the goodness of your heart, but "doing a favour for a friend" is a not unreasonable explaination for one or two now and then. How are Ofsted supposed to prove that's not the case unless they camp out in the garden and watch parents come and go? It's not helped because quite a few parents know they are cutting corners and will deny they're paying if Ofsted write to double check the "childminder's" story.

I have no particular suggestions of how this problem can be solved by the way - I just know it sucks as it is now.

Squirrel - I didn't know that! How stupid!