I'm a qualified nursery worker with 30 years experience, including many years as supply staff in many, many nurseries. I post here and there about nurseries but I thought I'd get the big stuff all down in one thread.
Point 1: Poor staff:
Copied from a post of mine in regard to male abusers in nurseries, but it also applies to staff who are unsuitable/rubbish at their jobs:
"One of the biggest problems generally, and one that affects this topic particularly, is that there just aren't enough people wanting to work with children. If a nursery needs a member of staff at the moment they're going to get 2 people apply and neither are great so they have to settle for the least bad option, even if they seem slightly dodgy. The only other options would be to ask some parents to leave or to close a whole room. Not going to happen. What we want is for 10 staff to apply so you can immediately turn down the suspect ones and pick the best out the rest."
And of course, some rubbish staff can get jobs in nurseries because the nursery is also rubbish and no good staff would want to work with them. (Point 3)
I've worked with staff who may not abuse children, but are so bad at their jobs they have no place in childcare. Some don't like talking to children, some can't be arsed to do any activities/change dirty children/read books, and one that threatened to ban Christmas.
There needs to be enough people wanting to work in nurseries for the bad ones to be able to fail. One issue is that careers advisors in schools, colleges etc have traditionally sent youngsters with the lowest of low abilities into "hair or care" jobs. Thanks for that, but by far the biggest problem is low pay. And low pay for huge responsibilities too. If you pay the minimum you get the minimum.
Solution 1: Pay more so you get good staff, and bad ones can fail.
Point 2: "Free places" don't work:
Why don't nurseries pay more to get good staff?
Because that would mean raising fees and many customers would leave to go to a cheaper nursery.
But wouldn't the cheaper nursery be worse?
Yes (Point 3).
However, the main reason why nurseries don't pay more is because of the government pay cap. They don't call it a pay cap though. The government call it "free childcare" and pay the nurseries for you. Unfortunately they don't pay very much. 85% of "free places" lose the nursery money, and they can't (officially) charge a top up. The government has effectively capped nursery income, which if the nursery wants to balance their books, caps expenditure too, which caps quality.
You get what you pay for. The mid-range of nurseries (most of them) are cutting and cutting in an attempt to still be profitable, meaning quality drops.
Solution 2a: The government pays nurseries what it costs to provide spaces, or allows top ups.
or
Solution 2b: The government gives qualifying parents £??? of vouchers they can spend on the childcare of their choice.
Point 3: Poor nurseries:
In the same way as bad staff need to be able to fail, bad nurseries need to be able to fail. Bad nurseries are fine at the moment because parents either can't tell they're bad (point 4), or they know they're bad but have no other choice. I've worked in many bad nurseries as supply staff and they're usually full.
Why don't the staff leave? Sometimes because they're bad staff and wouldn't be wanted anywhere else, but often because they don't know any better. When I started my qualification involved going to 6 different settings on placements, and then for work I'd often get to visit other nurseries for training or whatever. Nowadays nurseries hire trainees and keep things 'in house' so they don't get the opportunity to see anywhere better.
Solution 3: Let nurseries be profitable (point 2) so there are more of them and the bad ones can fail.
Point 4: Ofsted are crap:
How can parents tell if a nursery is good? Ofsted reports? If a nursery has a bad report you can probably believe it, although read the report rather than just the grade (I worked in a setting that dropped a grade because one bit of paper was filed wrong). If the nursery is graded positively it doesn't necessarily mean a thing. I've sometimes worked somewhere then read their last report and have been left with a feeling that the inspector had never actually visited the place. Vague generalisations like they don't want to risk having an opinion that could get them into trouble, or the report was written some time after visiting so they bullshit about stuff that could apply anywhere.
The main problem about ofsted inspections is that it grades nurseries according to one person's opinions on one day, when the staff are trying, and they have advance notice.
One "outstanding" nursery I worked in also had a training room. They had a dozen students that trained in the building a couple of days per week and the rest of the time had placements in various nurseries. On inspection day all training was cancelled and the nursery had an extra 2 people in all the rooms.
Nurseries often have an "ofsted box". It's full of things to whip out when inspectors come such as pens that work, new good books guaranteed to hold the children's attention, the legendary black doll etc.
In the past I've gone into a nursery on an inspection day and hardly recognised the place. Children playing with the "special" toys, so many activities out, and staff everywhere.
How can parents and staff find the good nurseries? By having reliable inspections.
Solution 4: Keep the main inspection that happens every 3 or 4 years. Good for checking policies, insurance etc. but introduce random hour long inspections a couple of times a year. Only an hour long or so, but long enough to count staff, see what the children are able to play with, check food quality etc.