Yes there are issues but free childcare expansion IS on track, insists Rishi

RISHI Sunak yesterday insisted the Government’s expansion of free childcare will proceed as planned – despite warnings the pledge was in ‘tatters’.

The Prime Minister said ‘some practical issues’ with the scheme would be resolved so that all families can get the childcare they are eligible for.

Last year, the Government unveiled an expansion of free childcare to include youngsters aged from nine months to five years in the 30 hours a week of paid-for care from September 2025. It will be rolled out in stages, with working parents of two-year-olds able to access 15 hours per week from this April.

But setbacks in the allocation of funding, staff shortages and IT problems are threatening the timeline of the scheme. Yesterday Labour said the childcare pledge was in ‘tatters’ because of Tory ‘bungling’, claiming it had left families ‘without the certainty of a childcare place they were promised’. The party’s education spokesman Bridget Phillipson told MPs that ‘families across this country [are] paying the price for Tory incompetence’. She asked a minister: ‘When will providers be told about their funding rates? How many families does he estimate will now not be able to access new hours because of this shambles?’

Children and families minister David Johnston said he would reserve the right to ‘name and shame’ local authorities which have yet to publish their funding rates.

And Mr Sunak told broadcasters yesterday that ‘everyone with twoyear-old kids will be able to get 15 hours’ from this spring.

The Prime Minister said: ‘That will be expanded to all those with ninemonth-olds later this year and then obviously next year 30 hours for all of those, completing the biggest expansion of childcare in our country’s history.’

Mr Sunak added: ‘Now, many families have been able to sign up and it’s all working fine, but there are some practical issues that certain families are facing.

‘I just want to reassure all of those people that those issues are being resolved as we speak.

‘All of those families will get the childcare that they are eligible for.’

‘Being resolved as we speak’

Eligible working parents have been able to apply for a code to access the scheme for two-year-olds since the start of January. But some families have been told they cannot apply for a code online until their ‘reconfirmation window’ in their government childcare account opens.

For some parents, this will not happen until March – prompting fears that they could miss out on the new scheme when it begins on April 1.

Now the Department for Education has said parents who cannot re-confirm online until the second half of February or March will be posted a code by HMRC before the middle of next month ‘without needing to take any action’.

But some nurseries have been unable to tell parents whether they will be able to accept the codes and offer funded places in April as they have not yet been given the funding rates by their local authority.

There are also doubts about the extension due in September because of a lack of nursery staff. The Times quoted unnamed Whitehall sources as saying ‘the strategy is flashing red all over the board’ and ‘September is going to be an absolute s*** show’.

Official figures, seen by the Mail, show the number of early years childcare places available has fallen by nearly 40,000 since 2018.

And there are almost 25,000 fewer providers since 2015, according to the Ofsted data.