Our (primary) head says kids can only have place (London Borough with schools shut) if there are two keyworker parents not one.

[AdmiralButterfly]

Is this legal? I thought school or council had to find school place if one parent a keyworker. A doctor friend explained this to me in lockdown one that if they didn’t have school place the other parent would be doing it 24 hours a day as the doctor parent needs to sleep after their shift not take over childcare.

@Thurlow

This is my fear too, though fortunately our schools aren't closed yet. DH does the absolutely horrid 10 day shift pattern (2-2-2 and 4 off) and I work from home four days a week. I have no idea how I'm supposed to keep our small house vaguely quiet enough for him to get decent sleep after night shifts while trying to entertain a 4yo, home school an 8yo and work 9-5 myself. It won't work for him, mainly.

I'll be begging for a keyworker place if it comes to it. And I mean, literally begging.

I was prepared to ask for unpaid leave but ended up furloughed. My LA insists both parents must be key workers. DH is, I am not. Our LA denied. Anyone who didn’t meet the requirements.

@InDireStraits

I have 3 employees who cannot work next week for this reason.

This is surely because the other parent (I assume the dad) won’t step up & do the parenting when their key worker partner is at work. This admittedly is often because the employers of men won’t accept them being disrupted in the same way that women often have to cope with.

Having said that I don’t necessarily think it’s right to enforce a both parents must be key workers rule.

I have to disagree with this! Im a key worker, dh isnt. He asked his company to furlough him for 3 months last year during lockdown 1 as our dcs nursery shut totally and I had to work. Guess what - when he went back to work he was the first to be made redundant when the company had to cut half it's workforce as he hadn't been there! He thankfully got another job in the same industry but due to when he started he is no longer entitled to furlough pay. If our dc nursery shuts again I have no idea what we will do.

Makes no odds if parent is off if place being held anyway.

Yes, unpaid time. Whichever parent gets paid less should be off if money is tight , keyworker or not.

Makes perfect sense for both parents having to be keyworkers.

It’s not so black and white. I’ve heard enough tales of children falling out of windows during lockdown, due to insufficient supervision and that has been borne out in the statistics. That’s on top of the obvious safeguarding risks.
No easy decisions here.

@hungrywalrus

It’s not so black and white. I’ve heard enough tales of children falling out of windows during lockdown, due to insufficient supervision and that has been borne out in the statistics. That’s on top of the obvious safeguarding risks. No easy decisions here.

That is true, no definitely not easy.

This was always the case here and is again. Was it different last time in your area?

@IndecentFeminist

Yes, because those other days can't be used anyway. 🙄 As was said, as nauseam.

This was the case in our school last time around too

I'm not sure that's across the board. DSS went in for three days a week later on in lockdown 1 as he has an EHCP. They then dropped a day and changed the pattern because they were over capacity so it's not like his space was booked up for a whole week even if just used on a specific day.

Another who hadn't realised that wasn't the case everywhere, since this first hit us in March.
IME Nursery and School managers will do what they can to help out families where circumstances are exceptional, but the very point is to have as few dc as possible on site. If every family that had one Key Worker in it accessed places, that would raise the numbers considerably.

Agree @zaffa, my DS’s school encouraged you to only use the days you required but a friends DC’s school said it was all or nothing so it varies.

Yes two key worker parents here. Seems fair enough.

@BackforGood

Another who hadn't realised that wasn't the case everywhere, since this first hit us in March. IME Nursery and School managers will do what they can to help out families where circumstances are exceptional, but the very point is to have as few dc as possible on site. If every family that had one Key Worker in it accessed places, that would raise the numbers considerably.

Schools do know who does what work wise, if I’d had someone who was able to be at home I never would have taken a space. That’s the thing, if school workers can’t come in because their child’s school won’t have them then that means less spaces for other people’s kids because there aren’t the staff to manage.

If the key worker parent is lower paid then the chances are that they would have to be the one to take unpaid leave and /or risk losing their job. This is a problem for the country, because there will be less keyworkers available to work at the time when they are needed most.

Our school it depends on the situation. They also do part time places where it would be hard for some of the week but some days there is a parent available.

There should be some discretion. I kept our DC at home with me during lockdown and struggled through like everyone else. However, DH now doing shift work changes the situation completely.

Whilst I agree it should generally be for two keyworker parents, there are going to be situations where the keyworker parent does night shifts and so it's not in the best interests of society for the kids to be at home. We don't want a country full of surgeons, paramedics, police officers and nurses who can't do their job effectively because they haven't been able to sleep for days off

I think this is generally how it is. They can't cater for everyone's individual needs and the point is so people can still go to work - if there is someone at home who will be there so the child isn't home alone then I think most schools will try to get you to keep your child at home. It's there so people don't have to take time off work in essential jobs. I understand that's not ideal for lots of parents but schools in pretty much every country are closed completely, I'm fairly sure.

@IndecentFeminist. Yes, that's what I meant. We can't expect families to sacrifice the higher wage so the key worker can continue to do their job if the children can't go to school. So we as a society will lose the services of the nurse/teacher/nursery worker/paramedic.

It was 2 key worker parents for our area last timescale but they did make exceptions for shift workers if needed.

I see what you're saying but the key worked list is vast. If everyone with just one parent as a key worker could still send their children there would still be tons of mixing and little would be achieved. It's only by taking strict measures are we actually going to see a difference.

In Spring 2020, there seemed to be fewer teaching staff off ill with covid or having to self-isolate because of covid.

No-one had long covid, as it was a new virus.

The pandemic has taken its toll on teaching staff as well. I don't think schools will have the same capacity as they did 9 months ago.

But if everyone sends their kids in because the key worker criteria is to lax you will have lots of children in to spread the virus which defeats the object of schools shutting in the first place.
I work in early years we are open but guessing a lot of staff will be of as they have no childcare and we are short staffed already so no idea how that's going to work when we open.

@Lochroy. Then we do have to accept that lots of key workers may be unable to work.

I think people need to understand it's not "childcare for if it's going to be hard having your kid at home", it's "childcare for if you are one of these specific jobs and having your child at home would mean you can't work"

Our council (Edinburgh) says you can only have a space if both parents are key workers, both working outwith the home, and have no friends or family that can have them. We fit all the criteria but it’s still an anxious time waiting to hear. Last time it was not needed as I’m a teacher and schools were closed but this time teachers are being asked to go in to school. The other issue is that there’s no breakfast club or after school club so not sure how that will work as I need to be at work 15 minutes before my children’s school starts and don’t finish until 15 minutes after them ( plus there’s a 20 minute commute!)