Government fails to act on Education Committee's early years recommendations
by Shannon Pite
The government has rejected a number of recommendations made by the Education Committee as part of its long-running inquiry into the early years. In July 2023, the Committee published a report 鈥 鈥 highlighting the urgent challenges facing the sector. The report contained a number of key recommendations for the government, including additional funding and SEND support; the reinstatement of previous staff:child ratios for two-year-olds; and a call to exempt early years settings from business rates and VAT.
However, in its response to the report, published on Tuesday 17 October, the government confirmed that it was not planning to take any action on many of these recommendations.
On the issue of funding, the government argued that it recognises the importance of setting funding rates that 鈥渞eflect the cost of early years childcare delivery鈥 but suggested that this had already been addressed through recent increases to early entitlement funding rates.
The government also stated that it has 鈥渘o plans to make changes to the business rates support provided to early businesses鈥 or to alter nurseries鈥 current VAT exemption.
It additionally rejected calls from the Committee to allow childminders to claim early entitlement funding for children who are related to them, arguing that this 鈥渨ould not be an effective use of public money and may have a negative impact on the viability of existing childcare businesses鈥.
Responding to the Committee鈥檚 recommendation that recent changes to staff:child ratio be 鈥渃losely monitored and reversed if quality and education outcomes are seen to suffer鈥, the government only stated that it will continue to monitor the changes and 鈥渒eep the policy under review鈥.
Commenting, Neil Leitch, CEO of the 无码天堂, said:
鈥淚t鈥檚 extremely disheartening that the government has completely wasted an opportunity to put in place meaningful change to address the raft of challenges facing the sector and families alike.
鈥淚n its report earlier this year, the Committee shed much-needed light on the array of critical challenges facing the early years, including 鈥 but by no means limited to 鈥 underfunding, recruitment and retention, and support for children with SEND.
鈥淲hat the sector needed in response was for the government to show it had listened 鈥 and, crucially, acted 鈥 on the findings. What we got, however, was a disappointing reiteration of recent policy announcements, combined with a complete refusal to budge on a number of key changes that would make a difference for the early years sector, such as ratios, funding and business rates relief.鈥
鈥淭he government says it recognises the importance of early education. Today鈥檚 response shows that it has once again failed to match this rhetoric with any meaningful action.鈥