Agenda item
Early Years Provision
Minutes:
The Chair introduced this item and stated the Sub-Committee wanted to focus and understand the take up of Early Year Provision by different demographic groups.
She said the parent Overview and Scrutiny Committee had held sessions, approximately 18 months ago looking at aspiration and achievement and whilst Tower Hamlets had a good track record in terms of the excellent progress children made in schools, the crux of progression and attainment lied in Early Year Provision and access to it.
The Chair, Ms Bex White said she wanted to focus on the take up by white working-class communities as data showed this to be low. She said the progression made by white working-class boys was a concern because there was a significant gap when children entered primary school. She continued saying she was aware of the funding and sustainability issues faced by the sector and wanted to understand the experience of providers in the sector, during the pandemic.
Ms Pauline Hoare, Head of Integrated Early Years Service made a presentation to the Sub-Committee. The key points made by Ms Hoare were:
- The Childcare Sufficiency Assessment (CSA) indicated the pandemic was having a negative impact on childcare take up. There had been a fall from 64% to 42% for eligible 2-year olds taking up the offer.
- Early year funding (EL2) is free early year education funded by the government. The DfE shares data on children who are eligible and the DWP provide a list of those eligible for universal credit. Ethnicity data is not provided.
- Take up has been affected by the pandemic and issues such as mental health, emotional wellbeing and low levels of early language acquisition are the key challenges. Mitigation of this is through early education and childcare provision.
- Some of the barriers are overcrowded accommodation, shared accommodation with elders, parental nervousness due to Covid-19 and school closures preventing young children attending childcare.
- Reduction in national funding will impact locally, with the number of places on offer decreasing. Post Covid-19 there is the likelihood childcare setting will accommodate 3-4 year olds as it attracts higher funding than 2 year olds.
- Tower Hamlets has 82 childcare providers, 120 childminders who work with the Children Centres in the borough.
The Sub-Committee then heard from Ms Kim Arrowsmith, Matchbox Day Nursery, Ms Toni Evans, Lincoln Hall Preschool and Ms Gill Oliver, Winterton House Nursery of the issues facing them in the pandemic.
The key points raised were:
- There had been a dramatic decrease in the number of children attending childcare settings, particularly 2-year olds. Ms Arrowsmith stated they had seen a drop from 98 children to 70 children, considering the social distancing rules. Ms Oliver stated numbers at her Nursery had fallen to 98 children from a 140 and Ms Evans stated the ratio of staff to child had been affected by the cases of Covid-19 at their nursery, resulting in less provision being provided.
- Nurseries had innovated by offering virtual classes however pressure on prioritising IT for older children meant the very young missed out. Packs for home learning had been provided to parents however it was uncertain if these had made a difference.
- Gaps in social communication skills and language development were envisaged for children transition to primary school.
- One of the biggest worries was income, especially with EL2 funding and the fear small to medium sized providers would feel the economic downturn.
In response to questions from members the following was noted:
- Barriers in take up of childcare places can be attributed to the general fear parents have about Covid-19 and the lockdown, plus anxiety of passing the virus to elderly grandparents in the extended family. The uptake of the vaccination, which stands at 37% had assisted in allying some of those fears and parental confidence is growing.
- The main barrier to take up is the hourly rate. This can be a significant disincentive. Tower Hamlets pays £6.50 per hour. Others pay £4.00 per hour. Ms Hoare said a significant amount of work would be required by the providers and council to re-encourage parents to take up places.
- Regarding the decrease in the London population and if this was reflected in the take up of places in early years, Ms Hoare said the population decrease affected all age groups and the figures from the DfE and DWP showed this drop. For example, last year more than 2500 children were eligible but currently there were 1785 children.
- Ms Hoare explained her service would have difficulty in providing a place to every parent and said the sufficiency strategy developed by the council in consultation with the providers, was to advertise and encourage take up at a slightly higher level than the current take up, so that businesses can grow. Ms Hoare said if too many places were created small fragile businesses were at risk of collapse. She said it was a complex situation.
- In respect to vaccinations, Ms Hoare said the government had not prioritised staff in these settings or offered them vaccinations has they had done with school staff. The nursery managers concurred with this view and said their staff felt forgotten and undervalued by government. Locally they had received a letter of appreciation from the Mayor.
- Ms Hoare said they did not have information on the number of parents who were furloughed but it was clear to her service that there was going to be funding challenges facing childcare providers with a significant reduction in the number of places available. She said parents who are currently furloughed may find the childcare setting closed or greater demand for limited places when they return to work.
- Ms Arrowsmith added her nursery had seen a drop in the number of days children attended especially where parents had been furloughed. She said places could not be held open indefinitely because as a business the nursery needed to secure income.
- The nursery managers confirmed the price of PPE had increased fifth fold with the purchasing of basics such as gloves, anti-bac and aprons costing substantially more money. Ms Arrowsmith said this was the general picture and was not related to supply and demand issues. Manufactures and sellers had inflated their prices knowing nurseries were obligated in purchasing these items.
- Ms Hoare said some practical assistance had been provided by the council through the Sliver Employment Group and said she would share the email sent by colleagues. She encouraged the nursery managers to apply for the financial help on offer.
- ACTION: Ms Hoare to provide a description of the offer made by the Silver Employment group to members of the sub-committee.
- In response to what the experience had been with ‘settling in’ 2-year olds, Ms Oliver said this was one of the positives of lockdown. She said they had changed their process which meant parents had to remain in one room, whilst the child got to know the staff and nursery. Ms Arrowsmith and Ms Evans stated they had similar experiences in settling in new children and overall children were settling in a lot quicker.
- In response to what the Council can do to coordinate a response to central government about PPE, Ms Hoare and the nursery managers said they would welcome the lobbying of central government about the issue of PPE along with access to testing and vaccinations.
The Chair thanked the attendees for their contribution to the meeting and said their input had been invaluable to members in understanding the situation in early year settings.
The Chair summarised the main points of discussion as follows:
- Funding of early year provision was critical to providers as well as families. The challenge was to ensure places were maintained and capacity building was at a pace that businesses can survive the financial strain of the pandemic.
- Access to devices for very young children to aid their learning with language acquisition and play.
- The learning gap created by the pandemic particularly the children transitioning to primary school and babies born in 2020/21 and their social interaction outside the family. The Sub-Committee needs to monitor the progress on this.
- Improved settling process, due to changes made to processes.
Recommendations
- The Children and Education Scrutiny Sub-Committee recommends the Mayor and the lead member for Children and Schools to continue lobbying for early years funding and the expansion of EL2 funding, because babies born in 2020/2021 will face additional challenges such as speech and language acquisition. Children who haven’t had real interaction from the day of their birth with other children and other people will require additional help when they are two-and three-year olds.
- The Children and Education Scrutiny Sub-Committee recommends the Early Years Service to closely monitor the impact the various different trends will have such de-population and if this is to the detriment of EL2 provision. More families may be entitled to EL2 provision due to unemployment and poverty owing to the pandemic. The demographics should be monitored closely to ensure children who are eligible are drawn from across the different communities in Tower Hamlets.
- The Children and Education Scrutiny Sub-Committee recommends the Lead Member for Children and Schools and Lead Member for Health and Wellbeing to look at the issues related to PPE, vaccinations and testing and consider if they can bulk purchase PPE to help smaller providers.
Supporting documents:
- Item 4.2 - cover Background reading papers, item 4.2 PDF 192 KB
- CSA 2021-22 Autumn Snapshot, item 4.2 PDF 309 KB
- Appendix 1 Occupied places 2019 2020, item 4.2 PDF 331 KB
- Appendix 2 PVI providers by ward, item 4.2 PDF 110 KB
- Appendix 3 DfE weekly data collection trend Graphs FINAL, item 4.2 PDF 638 KB
- 20210129 OS Feb 2021, item 4.2 PDF 146 KB