New look raises fears the sector is no longer a priority

There is mounting unease in the early years sector, following the Cabinet reshuffle, that early years and childcare policy is being pushed down the Department for Education’s to-do list.

While Sarah Teather was a minister of state for children and families, the two new ministerial appointments sharing this brief are both junior positions.

The new-look DfE includes two new parliamentary under-secretaries of states, both Conservative MPs.

Elizabeth Truss now has ministerial responsibility for education and childcare, while Edward Timpson replaces Tim Loughton as children and families minister, responsible for children and young people’s services, adoption and special educational needs.

In terms of seniority, Sarah Teather has been replaced by her Liberal Democrat colleague David Laws, who now holds the most senior position in the department under education secretary Michael Gove.

Mr Laws is now a minister of state for schools, jointly with a role in the Cabinet office, with a remit including the pupil premium.

Downgrading?

Former children’s minister Tim Loughton has also attacked the cuts to ministerial positions within the DfE. He served for seven years as shadow children’s minister and two years as a junior minister. His announcement on Twitter that he had been asked by the Prime Minister to ‘stand down’ from his ministerial post was met with a number of tributes.

Last week Mr Loughton criticised the Prime Minister for downgrading the importance of children and families within the DfE. On Twitter he wrote, ‘V worrying to see that children & young people brief downgraded to just 1 minister at DfE now and Dept net loss of 2 Minister of State ranks.’

His concern is echoed by Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Pre-School Learning Alliance, who said, ‘We understand that the post of minister for children has been demoted from minister of state to parliamentary under-secretary. We trust that this does not reflect the Government’s view that early years is now a lesser priority than before.’

He added, ‘The Government reshuffle has come at a crucial time for early years as the Government has just rolled out its revised Early Years Foundation Stage and begun to extend the free early years entitlement to two-year-olds.’

Commenting on Elizabeth Truss’ appointment, Mr Leitch said he looked forward to working with her and the new ministerial team, adding, ‘She has shown a keen interest in early years policy and the childcare issues facing families.’

However, the appointment of Elizabeth Truss could be a controversial one for the sector.

On the one hand she has already shown a great interest in the debate about how to make childcare more affordable for working parents, but it is well-known that she sees deregulation of early years as the answer, speaking out in favour of cutting red tape to boost childminder numbers. The same well-publicised views sparked a campaign earlier this year by the National Childminding Association against any moves to take childminders out of Ofsted’s inspection system.

Ms Truss is also in favour of relaxing the rules around ratios so that childminders can look after five children under five, as well as advocating an agency model to monitor childminders in place of Ofsted regulation.

On Nursery World’s blog, Penny Webb, who runs childminding service Penny’s Place in Kidderminster, Worcestershire, said, ‘It does seem that the Government is on a mission to push early years to the back of its agenda. It is very frustrating that we are only being given snippets of information from the Government and that everyone – individuals, organisations, trainers and local authorities – is all trying to make sense of (it).

‘All this uncertainty and the resulting rumours and speculation are causing worry, alarm and huge amounts of stress within the early years sector. The appointment of Ms Truss has only added to the concerns of the sector – because we are aware of the ideas she has expressed but we do not know if these are her current thoughts – or if after further research she now has other ideas.

‘It would really help if she, or someone else in Government could issue details of the direction in which they plan to go – followed by a full and detailed consultation.

Deregulation worry

‘I also hope that the Government will take note of the reject deregulation petition that I am now leading on, because it is clear now that although the petition was originally set up against deregulation of childminders, we are now facing deregulation, at some level, for all early years settings.’

Also commenting on Nursery World’s blog, Karine wrote, ‘The Government has a different agenda. Inspection of childminders costs them quite a bit of money and time – deregulation would get rid of this. However, it would be a backward step for all concerned. Ms Truss wants affordable childcare. Does this mean by deregulating childminders the revenue gained will be put back into subsidising childminders’ costs per child, so that a reduced fee can be passed onto parents? I think not. Childminders can charge what they like and each county rate is different.’

Liz Bayram, joint chief executive of the National Childminding Association said that the organisation was ‘looking forward to continuing to work positively with the DfE, DWP and wider government.’

‘We are especially keen to ensure that the new ministerial team understands our members’ concerns around proposals to change both the regulation of registered childminding and, as part of this, to increase adult to child ratios. As well as setting out these concerns in our submission to the Childcare Commission, we have written to the new ministers to reiterate these,’ she said.

The National Day Nurseries Association said it hoped for more to be done to address the issue of funding shortfalls for free entitlement places and for the Government to consider the exemption of nurseries from VAT and business rates. Chief executive Purnima Tanuku said, ‘We are keen to engage with Elizabeth Truss, and also feel that the NDNA and the nursery sector can make a significant contribution to David Laws’ child poverty and social mobility brief and to Edward Timpson’s Special Educational Needs brief.

Asked by Nursery World whether childcare and early years were now lesser priorities in light of changes to ministerial roles in the reshuffle, the department signalled more change ahead.

A spokesperson said, ‘The Department for Education is now escalating the importance of children and families policy. We will shortly be making announcements on childcare, children in care, adoption, fostering, internet safety, shared parenting, the role of the Children’s Commissioner, special educational needs, and social work reform which will demonstrate greater radicalism and ambition to help children and young people than any previous Government.’