parent run creche - solution to working mums and dads???

[Laia]

Hi!
i just want to share a little scheme that as creative mums and dads we have set up in East London...basically we share the cost of a childminder between 5 families and each parent works one day a week.
It works, it's affordable and it allows parents to work whilst we know our children are in good hands.
If you want to know more. let me know.

I think this is a brilliant idea, as is one operated by my sister. Five parents have got together and each one looks after the others' children for one day - quite an exhausting day perhaps but the benefit is it's free. And some people find that having other children is in fact easier than coping with just your own all day.

Batters, that incident would worry me too. I have a friend in San Franciso and his children attend something called a co-op nursery, which is largely run by parents. Apparently it's very common in his neck of the woods. I cannot describe the scheme in detail, but I gather all parents are expected to help a set number of hours per term. He seems very happy with it,although when I think of the severely angst-ridden, dressed-in-black-twenty-five year old I knew, pre-USA emigration, I find it hard picture him coping with 20 tinies in the sandpit!

Laia, i have a question for you about the legal side of things. As I understand it there is an upper limit on the number of children that a childminder can look after in their own home - and I thought it was 3? Also I read something about the fact that you can't even look after friends' children over that number - is your scheme registered with your local council?

I'm not an inspector....just an interested parent!