The Government has announced that £100 million is being made available for early years places, with the funding intended to help settings increase their physical space.

The government stated that this influx of funding would potentially add thousands of new places across the country.

Parents across the country will be able to see what additional childcare support they will be entitled to over the coming months and years.

The updated eligibility checker on childcarechoices.gov.uk is now live, and allows parents to access personalised information on the support available to them, including which of the new childcare offers they will be eligible for depending on the age of their child and earnings.   

The website will also give parents the opportunity to sign up for regular updates letting them know when they should take action to make sure they are getting the support they are entitled to. This includes when the new 15 free hours for two-year-olds shortly becomes available for sign-ups, with the offer beginning in April 2024.  

Education secretary, Gillian Keegan, said: 

“No one should have to choose between having a career and having a family, so I’m determined that every parent who wants it should have access to the childcare they need. 

“Flexibility is at the heart of our plans to transform childcare for families, whether it’s offering quality childcare out of school hours or making sure there are more early years places where they’re needed most.  

“This is the largest investment in childcare in our history, so I encourage people with young children or those thinking about starting a family to visit the Childcare Choices website to find out what they’re eligible for.”

Local authorities are also today receiving details of their allocation from the £289 million wraparound childcare fund.

Policy experts respond

Neil Leitch, chief executive of the Early Years Alliance, said:

“While any support to boost capacity in the sector is of course welcome, the fact is that all the physical space in the world won’t achieve anything if we don’t have sufficient early years staff to deliver places and meet increased demand from families.

“For years now, the sector has urged the government to tackle the recruitment and retention crisis in the early years, calls that have continued to fall on deaf ears. With only a few months to go until the start of the rollout of the extended offer, it’s vital that the government ensures that we have the infrastructure in place to deliver the places it has promised to families – but while supporting providers to increase physical capacity is a part of this, it is only a small part. 

“As such, we continue to urge that government to focus its efforts on building and sustaining a strong, stable early years workforce by ensuring fair rates of pay through adequate funding rates, professional respect and recognition, and clear career progression. Anything less, and parents around the country looking forward to access the extended early entitlement offer next year are likely to be left sorely disappointed.”

Purnima Tanuku OBE, chief executive of NDNA said: “NDNA called for capital funding to be made available on the back of evidence from our members that 72% needed to physically expand in order to offer more places to one and two-year-olds.

“We now need to ensure this money is passed to those providers who are actually working with the youngest children where the expansion in places is planned. Local authorities must make sure this money is available to all types of provider in their local area and don’t duplicate existing high quality provision.

“There are still a lot of challenges for providers to be able to access this support and undertake any works as the expansion starts next April. A big concern will also be business rates which can deter investment in early years settings as it drives up day-to-day running costs.

“Parents and providers need to have clear information about what is on offer, the eligibility criteria and when registration will be possible. Providers need clarity on this policy so they are able to plan for new places. The biggest challenge to this policy is underfunding, especially for three and four-year old places, as well as staffing.”