Well, I recognise some of these situations from my own experiences of working in day nurseries unfortunately, and although whilst I agree with what the majority has said regarding scaremongering, I also think that the journalist makes valid points.
For example, my first day nursery assistant job when I was 18. I had no expereince of working with children in ANY capacity, with the exception of the odd baby sitting stint, but on my very first day, I was left in sole charge of the pre-school room. I approached the nursery manager and explained that although I wasn't sure of the 'rules' I was pretty sure that as an unqualified un polic checked person, it was not allowed. I was told that it was tough, I was the only one to do it and was shut in the pre-school room for the rest of the day. In the three years I worked there, I never once had to undergo a CRB check and the only formal training I had was as part of my NVQ studies.
This has been the case in all but one setting I worked in. Lack of qualified people taking sole charge of rooms/groups of children, lack of appropriate checks. Unfortunately, it does happen.
The point of lack of money paid to child carers is also a very valid one in my eperience and again I have found myself in a variety of situations where I have been earning under the legal national minimum wage. Nurseries tend to promise staff all manner of discounts for their own children and incentives such as free uniform and health care discounts but they never seem to materialise. For this reason, I have had to change jobs in the sector numerous times because I simply cannot afford to keep my family on the poor wages that the job affords me.
As for inspections, having been through the process numerous times in my numerous jobs, I would agree that in the past, the inspections are not always worth the paper they are written on, but this is in the days before spot inspections. However, even though this is the case now, nurseries IME still have a rough idea when Ofsted are going to come knocking and so the preparations begin in the months leading up to it.
I have only ever worked in one nursery where the inspection was favourable (outstanding) and deserved because the staff were all qualified to above the national minimum, or at least undertaking NVQs or equivalent qualifications. Unqualified staff are not to be left alone and those withouth CRB checks are, regardless of qualification, unable to be left alone with the children. The proprietor of the chain (3 nurseries) was passionate about the job, and made sure through rigorous interviewing and reference checking that the staff she employed were too. The money was still shit tbh, but at least it actually met minimum wage requirements.
This is not intended to add any further guilt to working parents. I am one myself and DD has attended every nursery I have ever worked in. I'm just saying that I can and have seen the negative sides represented in the article and unfortunately, until childcare/early years work is better recognised by the powers that be, these situations will keep arising. It doesn't help that a CRB check can take up to 2 months to come back.