Do you have a 3- or 4-year-old and can’t access 30 hours of funded childcare? Would you be willing to share your experience?

[TheSuttonTrust]

A child’s early years play a significant role in determining their chances later on in life. Currently, all three- and four-year-olds in England are entitled to 15 hours of early education and childcare per week. Some families meeting certain requirements are also entitled to an additional 15 hours, making a total of 30 hours.

Often the children and families who need childcare the most don’t get access to the full 30 hours. This could be because they aren’t working enough hours, aren’t earning enough money or their shift patterns mean they don’t qualify.

Currently under the current eligibility criteria for the 30 hours entitlement, it is predominantly children in better off homes who are eligible for a full-time place. This means many families are ‘locked out’ of extra childcare.

The Sutton Trust has a campaign called A Fair Start which aims to influence the government to reform the system to allow better access to the 30 hours entitlement and ensure that families who could really benefit from extra childcare are able to access it.

The Sutton Trust is looking for parents willing to share their stories to help with their campaign, which aims to give all children access to great early years education.

They are looking for parents who:

• couldn’t access the full 30 hours childcare support for whatever reason. This might be they weren’t working enough, earning enough or their shift patterns meant they didn’t qualify
• wanted to go back to work or increase their hours, but it wasn’t financially viable as they couldn’t immediately access the 30-hour offer.

We’re hoping to find parents willing to share their experience to help us get the policy changed. If you’ve struggled to get 30 hours of childcare, please email with a short explanation about your experience to [email protected]

You can find out more about the Trust’s campaign here: www.suttontrust.com/a-fair-start-equity-in-access-to-early-years-education.

Personally I think it’s all very unclear. You don’t have to be working 30 hours nor is there a minimum amount you have to earn. You can work 16 hours and receive 30 hours childcare. Or you can start a business and earn £0 for the first year but still receive 30 hours childcare. Lots of lower earning families don’t know they can claim in these circumstances.

You're right.

It's often the children and families who need childcare the most don’t get access to the full 30 hours, for a range of reasons, and it's predominantly children in better off homes who are eligible for a full-time place under the current eligibility requirements!

We want to campaign to change the policy, and we are looking for people who would be willing to speak to us about their experience! If you know of anyone, or have any networks that you could share our campaign with to raise awareness, that would be greatly appreciated.

As said above, please contact [email protected] with any queries.

Will do the survey.

We aren't eligible as FT working DH and a part time student (me), we didn't qualify.

Where I live in London commuter zone it doesn't make any difference anyway as every nursery in our area require you by contract to pay for additional hours (they only accept 5 days a week, 8am-6pm) to top up in addition to the 30 funded hours.

Meaning a bill of £100s more than I could earn if I went back to full time (in order to get the funded place), and then I would need to add on wrap around hours (breakfast and tea club) to fit with shift pattern (nurse rota) so we'd be financially much worse off and I would never see our children.

We are so sorry to hear of your situation. There are unfortunately many others who share your experience across the country.

We would be incredibly grateful if you would be willing to email with a short explanation about your experience to [email protected]. And please do share this with any other parent/in your networks to help us raise awareness, that would also be greatly appreciated.

As a an ex childminder, parents were eligible to take the funding at weekends if they were lucky enough to find a childminder who would offer it at weekends. I did not know one childminder who was prepared to work weekends for the rates of pay from the funded hours . If they worked weekends and out of normal working hours it was charged at a higher rate as was seen as un social-able hours. I stopped childminding due to the funding rates of pay.

We access only a portion of our hours as have to do a 6 hour or 10 hour day at nursery. 2x 10 hour days does not equal the 30 hours when averaged across the year (not just term time only) so we lose about 2 hours per week. If we could do 3x 7.5 hr days we would.

We weren’t eligible for the 30 hours because I earned too much.

I live rurally and none of the nurseries I could, would or do send my children to accept the 30 hours.

@Fridafever

We weren’t eligible for the 30 hours because I earned too much.

Over 100k then? Weirdly I don't have a lot of sympathy for that one!

We were entitled but due to my child's birthday being just after the start of a term we missed out on almost a full term of funding which was quite unfair!

@TheSuttonTrust

You're right.

It's often the children and families who need childcare the most don’t get access to the full 30 hours, for a range of reasons, and it's predominantly children in better off homes who are eligible for a full-time place under the current eligibility requirements!

We want to campaign to change the policy, and we are looking for people who would be willing to speak to us about their experience! If you know of anyone, or have any networks that you could share our campaign with to raise awareness, that would be greatly appreciated.

As said above, please contact [email protected] with any queries.

Childcare is so expensive and even those parents from "better off homes" are struggling massively to balance the books. If you search on here you'll see two recent threads about how families are crippled by childcare costs. It's certainly not the case at all that the majority of people using 30 hours are rolling in cash. We have had to take a lodger to pay for DS's nursery and are fully reliant on the 30 hours to be able to afford to take another maternity leave, otherwise would have our house repossessed as we couldn't pay the mortgage. We are a two parent working family with salaries in the 60/70,000 but our accommodation cost is £3000 a month and nursery is an extra £900. Our wonderful nursery has just opened an in-house food bank (which absolutely broke my heart) for families struggling who are eligible for EYF or with a sibling on FSM. This suggests that there are a significant number of children attending from the most deprived backgrounds which is fantastic. It's absolutely disgusting that these poor families are struggling to such an extent to make ends meet. But it is also essential that an image isn't created of the middle classes swimming in cash while benefiting from free hours.

Also the main issue is the fact that parents are forced to give up work in the first place due to the astronomical cost of childcare from 0-3 years old. Free hours at any age would transform families' experiences.

I couldn’t agree more with @cafedesreves, the OP is making out that those of us who are (or will be) entitled to the 30 hours have loads of spare cash to throw around and so shouldn’t get the benefit. Our join net take home is £3.5k. Out of that, £1000 a month is nursery and £150 a month is after school childminder. With our mortgage and bills on top we are barely breaking even each month, a couple of times we’ve had to hit the credit card for general spends. Once 18 month old DS qualifies for the 30 hours we will have spent over £24,000 on his nursery fees alone. There are threads of parents having to take out loans to cover the costs of childcare.

Nurseries are closing left right and centre because the money they receive for the funding doesn’t cover their costs, but if we didn’t receive any funding when he turns 3 we’d be driven into debt to pay for it.

Thanks @QforCucumber.

What would be interesting would be to ask in your organisation how many Sutton Trust employees are reliant on the 30 hours to make ends meet in their family. My guess is, like many people, it's essential.

Not specifically 30 free hours related, but I'm originally from Germany (now living in the UK), where childcare is heavily subsituted. It depends on where you live but you may pay for example about £200 per month for a full nursery place. There are many other problems with childcare in Germany (not least the lack of available places and the fact that many nurseries only take 3 year olds upwards), but this is a massive help to any working family.

A lot of families who qualify for 30 free hours aren't rolling in money and it is a massive help. Your OP is only looking at one very small part of the help available.

Your OP suggests that 'wealthy' families are benefiting from this help whilst no one else does. However lots of low income families actually get free childcare from 2 years old, instead of having to wait until the 30 free hours, which starts the term after they turn 3. Also even if they don't qualify for the 30 free hours they do still qualify for the 15 free hours at 3/4.

"All 3 to 4-year-olds in England can get 570 free hours per year. It’s usually taken as 15 hours a week for 38 weeks of the year, but you can choose to take fewer hours over more weeks, for example."

The cost of childcare http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/amiibeingunreasonable/4459859-The-cost-of-childcare

Here is one thread

[quote TheSuttonTrust]A child’s early years play a significant role in determining their chances later on in life. Currently, all three- and four-year-olds in England are entitled to 15 hours of early education and childcare per week. Some families meeting certain requirements are also entitled to an additional 15 hours, making a total of 30 hours.

Often the children and families who need childcare the most don’t get access to the full 30 hours. This could be because they aren’t working enough hours, aren’t earning enough money or their shift patterns mean they don’t qualify.

Currently under the current eligibility criteria for the 30 hours entitlement, it is predominantly children in better off homes who are eligible for a full-time place. This means many families are ‘locked out’ of extra childcare.

The Sutton Trust has a campaign called A Fair Start which aims to influence the government to reform the system to allow better access to the 30 hours entitlement and ensure that families who could really benefit from extra childcare are able to access it.

The Sutton Trust is looking for parents willing to share their stories to help with their campaign, which aims to give all children access to great early years education.

They are looking for parents who:

• couldn’t access the full 30 hours childcare support for whatever reason. This might be they weren’t working enough, earning enough or their shift patterns meant they didn’t qualify
• wanted to go back to work or increase their hours, but it wasn’t financially viable as they couldn’t immediately access the 30-hour offer.

We’re hoping to find parents willing to share their experience to help us get the policy changed. If you’ve struggled to get 30 hours of childcare, please email with a short explanation about your experience to [email protected]

You can find out more about the Trust’s campaign here: www.suttontrust.com/a-fair-start-equity-in-access-to-early-years-education.[/quote]
Also any working parents "need childcare the most" or they would lose their job and income. There is no other option for most families.

Also any working parents "need childcare the most" or they would lose their job and income. There is no other option for most families.

I think this is a really interesting point. I'd also be interested by what is meant by 'wealthy'. There is a huge gap between those who don't earn enough to qualify and wealthy. I have two children, am an upper pay-scale teacher and have a husband who earns a similar amount to me. If I didn't get 30 hours for my older child it simply wouldn't be worth working the hours I do (or my husband working the hours he does, doesn't matter which of us it applies to) for almost all of it to go on childcare. I don't think it's unreasonable as an experienced professional on a fair salary to be able to afford to go to work.

My daughter can't access 30 hours because she hasn't got a job. She can't get a job because she doesn't have childcare.
The nursery won't / can't tell her what hours are available so she can't negotiate with any employers.
She would be minimum wage.
The nursery sent her an email saying if he goes 2 full days a week she still has to pay £142 a month ??
Would she get help with this from UC ?
All year round nursery so it's the hours are spread over 51 weeks.

@JSL52 the extra payment is normal, DS1 nursery when he got the 30 hours still charged £7 a day for meals and consumables, they also didn’t spread the 30 hours over the year but it was term time only so the bill could go from £21 a week to £158 a week.

There are many, many issues with the cost of childcare. We were entitled to the 30 hours, but here are some of the problems we encountered despite earning £60k between us at the time:

• Missed out on five months of funding as DS was born twelve hours after the termly cut off. That meant we paid about £6k in fees v £2.5k

• Still needed to pay £400-500 per month to cover care around the 30 hours

• Petty local council admin procedures for registering for “codes” requiring multiple forms to be filled out every single term with the same information before a code could be input into another government system. I’m good at admin but found this arduous.

[quote QforCucumber]@JSL52 the extra payment is normal, DS1 nursery when he got the 30 hours still charged £7 a day for meals and consumables, they also didn’t spread the 30 hours over the year but it was term time only so the bill could go from £21 a week to £158 a week.[/quote]
Thank you.

Hello all,

Thank you for all of the responses to our thread and thank you for taking the time to engage with this important issue, we are incredibly grateful for all of your contributions to this discussion.

We want to see the 30 hour entitlement made available to all families - many poorer families currently cannot access it and we are concerned about the impact this is having on many children's access to early education (ensuring equal access to educational opportunities is a major focus for our organisation). We do also agree that there are many other challenges also facing parents, and that childcare is unaffordable for many families across the country, not just the poorest.

For anyone who is interested to find out more, we have number of recommendations to the Government in our 2021 report A Fair Start: Equalising access to early years education www.suttontrust.com/our-research/a-fair-start-equalising-access-to-early-education/.

As previously mentioned, we want to change the policy, and we would be incredibly grateful if anyone who cannot currently access the 30 hour entitlement would be willing to speak to us about their experience. Additionally, if you know of anyone, or have any networks that you could share our campaign with to raise awareness, that would be greatly appreciated.

Please contact [email protected] with any queries in regards to the campaign. Thank you all again for your contributions to the thread!

Thanks so much for responding. It sounds very sensible, I think it's just really important to be careful that the language doesn't unintentionally give the impression that parents are somehow sharp elbowed or greedy in applying for this funding for their kids.
I suppose it's not entirely surprising that many of the families who use this are earning more, as it was specifically set up for working parents, and for those kids in 2 parent families, that would mean dual income families (as SAHP families don't qualify) who are likely to be earning more as there are 2 parents working. They are also likely to be paying more in childcare.

However, I agree it makes sense that all children are able to access this funding, as this would hugely support children from less well-off backgrounds. I suppose it's the rhetoric around "doubly advantaging the better off" that would be useful to explain more. It makes people feel guilty when they are desperately trying to make ends meet whilst working. Many working mums such as me already feel conflicted enough about working full time without extra guilt for accessing funding!

Just read a bit more. I think universalising the 30 hours from 2 like they've done in Scotland makes a huge amount of sense!