The final item of business is a members’ business debate on motion S4M-15741, in the name of Cara Hilton, on childcare costs spiralling in Scotland. The debate will be concluded without any question being put.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament notes the annual childcare costs survey published by the Family and Childcare Trust; understands that the report provides the most comprehensive analysis of childcare costs and availability in Britain; is concerned at the finding that, while average childcare prices have risen only in line with inflation in the rest of the UK, with the cost of a part-time nursery place for a child under two up by 1.1%, in Scotland the price rose by 4.1%, with the average price of a part-time nursery place for a child under two and an after-school club for a five year old now costing £7,933 a year; is further concerned that, in Scotland, only 13% of local authority areas report having enough childcare for working parents and only 9% can provide childcare needed for disabled children and that the cost of childcare is rising at a significantly faster rate than anywhere else in the UK; welcomes the expansion of preschool early education and childcare in Dunfermline and across Scotland but recognises too what it considers the lack of progress in ensuring that childcare is available that fits in with the lives of working parents and for children of all ages, and notes the calls of the Family and Childcare Trust for the Scottish Government to improve access and affordability for parents to ensure that parents and carers across Scotland have access to flexible, quality and affordable childcare for children of all ages.
19:22
One of the biggest challenges facing mums and dads in my Dunfermline constituency and in communities right across Scotland is the cost, quality, availability and flexibility of childcare. It is particularly ironic that we are debating the issue in the evening, because virtually no childcare is available for mums and dads who work at nights and at weekends—at hours that do not fit in with what is on offer from most childcare providers—or indeed when working hours change from one day to the next, as they seem to have done in Parliament in recent weeks.
Like many working mums, with three children of primary school age, I manage to juggle childcare only due to a combination of out-of-school care, granny and grandma, friends and my husband, but not everyone has that support network. Childcare challenges certainly do not end when children start school, but at least the days of paying out more for childcare than for rent or the mortgage are largely over. However, Scottish parents still face an average school club bill of £53 a week for each child and, according the Family and Childcare Trust survey, school club bills for parents in Scotland have risen by 8.5 per cent in the past year alone.
On pre-school childcare, the Family and Childcare Trust found that the average cost of 25 hours of childcare for a child aged nought to two is £111 a week in a nursery or £102 a week with a child minder, and the figure reduces only slightly for children aged two and over. Many parents who have more than one child in childcare will be paying double that or more.
A parent with two children who are under the age of five will pay a staggering £900 a month for 25 hours of childcare. That adds up to over £10,000 a year. If a parent works full time and needs full-time childcare, the sum will be higher still. With nursery costs for children who are over two years old up 4.1 per cent last year in Scotland—that is higher than anywhere else in the United Kingdom outside London—the bills keep on rising.
Childcare costs are the biggest single bill that parents face, and it is little surprise that, for many mums and dads who are faced with such high childcare costs, there is little option but to reduce their hours at work or give up their job or career altogether. That impacts on not just parents, but on our society and our economy.
Many parents will struggle along and end up in debt. A report by Save the Children found that a third of low-income parents get into debt to pay for childcare. Other families find the money by cutting back on food, day trips and holidays. Many more manage only by working opposite shifts, which undermines family life and home relationships.
It is not just a question of costs. The Family and Childcare Trust research found that just 13 per cent of Scottish local authorities have enough childcare to meet the needs of working parents. That contrasts with the situation in England, where 45 per cent have enough childcare, and Wales, where 40 per cent have enough childcare.
Does Cara Hilton agree that it would be helpful as the next stage forward if local authorities were under some obligation at least to map the provision in their areas so that the level of unmet need could be quantified and steps could be taken to address that?
Liam McArthur must have seen my speech already, as I will turn to that issue shortly.
Things are getting worse. The figure that I mentioned is down 2 per cent on last year’s figure, and it compares with 23 per cent in 2014. It is also a concern that just 9 per cent of local authorities have enough childcare for parents with disabled children. Only 4 per cent can cater for parents with atypical work patterns.
All of that highlights why there is an urgent need for genuine national oversight of childcare policy to ensure that the needs of parents in Scotland can be met. Despite the obligation in the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 for local authorities to consult and publish plans for childcare for both under-fives and out-of-school care, 16 local authorities in Scotland told the Family and Childcare Trust that they had no information about local childcare supply and parental demand for it. If local authorities and providers have little knowledge of the needs of local parents, how can they intervene to fill the gaps in provision?
It was Scottish Labour that first introduced free early learning and childcare for three and four-year-olds. My motion welcomes the Scottish Government’s extension of provision to 600 hours, but the reality is that, although that is great for children’s development, it has very little impact on the childcare costs of the majority of working parents. Few jobs fit around a space that is available for three hours a day during term-time only, and many parents continue to pay a childminder or nursery while their child uses their free space—that is often the only way to keep their childminder or private nursery space available.
Other parents are unable to access their free hours at all due to their work patterns and a lack of free spaces available in private nurseries. Moreover, many councils have a lack of enthusiasm for allowing childminders to become partner providers.
The fair funding for our kids campaign has found that as many as one in five children are not getting the place that they are entitled to. That has been backed up the National Day Nurseries Association, which has said that 43 per cent of private nurseries have had the number of free places that they can offer to parents capped. On average, there is a waiting list of 11 children for each free space that children are entitled to but cannot access.
Throughout Scotland, thousands of parents are unable to access their free entitlement because of the lack of flexibility that still exists. It is a concern that the Family and Childcare Trust report found little evidence to suggest that action is being taken to address that.
I know that the Minister for Children and Young People is well aware of those issues and is as keen to find a solution as I am, but it is frustrating for mums and dads who are already juggling work, family and childcare to listen to politicians in the Parliament saying that parents are hundreds of pounds a year better off thanks to free childcare when the spin quite often does not reflect the reality of parents’ lives.
The reality for parents throughout Scotland is that childcare costs are spiralling faster than anywhere else in the UK outside London. The cost of a nursery place has risen by up to 30 per cent in Scotland over this session of the Parliament.
Last year, the commission for childcare reform set out a bold vision for the transformation of childcare. The Family and Childcare Trust has also urged urgent reform of the system. I also highlight the fair funding for our kids proposal for a 10-year plan to transform childcare in Scotland. We know that investment in quality and affordable early learning and childcare is crucial not just because it makes work pay, but because it helps to close the attainment gap and supports our economy and employers. It seems that we all want change, and no one wants it more than mums and dads who are faced with huge childcare bills.
Once more, the debate is being shaped by point scoring over free hours. For May’s election, parents are being promised more free childcare, with a doubling of free hours for three and four-year-olds by 2020. I do not have the time now to discuss the challenges in making that happen, but experts, providers, academics, children’s organisations and, above all, parents agree that childcare has to be about affordability, quality and flexibility, as well as free hours.
Scotland needs a childcare policy designed to fit around the lives of working parents, not designed to fit on an election leaflet or pledge card. It is not just about free hours, good as those are. We need a childcare system that supports parents with children of all ages—a system that recognises that childcare challenges do not end when children start school, which supports parents not just with pre-schoolers but with babies and toddlers, which puts affordability and flexibility at its heart, and which supports working parents and our economy, too.
Whatever the result in May, I hope that we can work together across the political divide to deliver the childcare revolution that Scotland’s families need and that Scotland’s children deserve.
19:30
I thank Cara Hilton for bringing this important debate to the chamber tonight. I also thank her for some of her comments on how we progress the issues and work together in order to deliver for the families throughout Scotland.
As far as I am concerned, we are coming from a place where the Scottish Government has an ambitious programme to give children the best start in life. As Cara Hilton mentioned, the amount of free childcare for three and four-year-olds has been raised from 415 to 475 hours and now to 600 hours. That will make a difference. In addition, vulnerable two-year-olds will get that free childcare, too.
The Scottish Government is delivering for our families, who all receive the same provision. Our plans are ambitious. The First Minister recently went on record to say that she sees the biggest capital spend and investment in the future being on childcare. That may not be easy to show like a big, shiny new bridge or a road infrastructure project, but such investment makes a big difference to families throughout our nation.
On top of that, if the Scottish National Party forms the next Government, it wants to increase the free provision up to 1,140 hours before the end of the next parliamentary session. I mentioned capital spend. We are talking about investment £170 million-worth. That would make a difference.
I also have a personal interest in this issue. I know that I look too young, but I am a grandparent. My daughter, Jessica, is going back to education. She is looking at care for her daughter, Daisy, to ensure that she can do that. Daisy is coming up to one and a half, but eventually—when she is two or three—Jessica will get that opportunity. Therefore, I understand on a practical level how difficult it can be for families, but the Government is doing what it can to ensure that free childcare will make a difference in local areas.
Cara Hilton brought up some figures on the costs of childcare. It is just not the case that the average weekly cost of 24 hours of nursery childcare in Scotland is more than it is in England. In England, the cost is £113; in Scotland, the cost is £104. That is an example of where childcare in Scotland is cheaper. For 50 hours childcare a week, the regional average cost in England is £221; in Scotland, that cost is £203. Although the costs are quite a bit for families to deal with, the situation is not as bad as others have said that it is.
I see the Government’s planned investment as the exciting part of the debate. To declare even more of an interest in this topic, my daughter plans to train as a nursery nurse. Part of the Government’s investment is about ensuring that young women such as her, as well as young men, have the opportunity to get involved in the sector.
We have to remember that that is part of the debate—we must build the infrastructure to the stage that we can ensure that we deliver for all families in Scotland. At this stage, we have the Scottish Government commitment and there is upwards movement in the hours of childcare provided. The only issue is to see how we take provision to the next stage and ensure that we deliver for all the young people and families.
19:34
I congratulate Cara Hilton on securing this debate on a critical issue for families. The figures in the Family and Childcare Trust report, to which the motion refers, are both dramatic and damning. They show that childcare in Scotland is unaffordable and is getting more unaffordable, and that childcare is more unaffordable in Scotland than it is in the rest of the UK, in spite of the gloss that Mr Adam tried to put on that.
There are consequences for families across Scotland. Cara Hilton went through in detail some of the ways in which families deal with that, but there are probably two fundamental ways in which families deal with unaffordable childcare. One is that one parent, usually the mother, simply does not work. She gives up work or is unable to take up work, with all the consequences that that has for the family income and for career prospects. The second strategy that is often pursued is that grandparents take the strain. Last year, the Family and Childcare Trust produced a report that was based on a survey of how much childcare grandparents provide, and it was discovered that the majority of grandparents in Scotland provide some support for childcare and that the figure in Scotland is much higher than that in the rest of the UK.
We should ask ourselves how we got into this situation. We know how we got here, because the childcare alliance, to which Cara Hilton referred, undertook a significant piece of work when it set up its commission for childcare reform. It was clear about where we had gone wrong on childcare in recent years and it said that the single-minded focus on free pre-school hours to the exclusion of all else had had detrimental policy consequences for other and necessary forms of childcare. Providers too have told us in recent weeks that the underfunding of free childcare places has meant that additional costs have been passed on to parents and families who are paying for their childcare or for the additional hours that they need in order to work full time.
The childcare alliance was absolutely clear that what families need is childcare that is flexible all year round, is for all ages and is affordable, not just free. There is no reason why we cannot deliver that, because other countries do it. Other countries provide childcare in a way that means that childcare arrangements do not come to a grinding halt three times a year when the school holidays start, and in a way that people know will not bankrupt them, because there is a limit on the proportion of their income that they will have to spend on it. Those countries do not invest more public funds than we do; they invest similar amounts and get much more back for it.
The onus on the minister is to take the opportunity this evening to at least signal a shift in the Government’s thinking—to say not that it will go into the election simply boasting about free pre-school hours, which on many occasions in recent years has really meant playing catch-up with the rest of the United Kingdom, but rather that it will present a plan to move forward and bring about the transformation in childcare that families in Scotland want and need, which we can achieve if we have the political will to do it.
19:39
I, too, thank Cara Hilton, because any opportunity to debate childcare in the early years is welcome. In this institution, we talk about higher education and schools, but I have no doubt—after almost a couple of decades in this Parliament—that the most important part of the education process is pre-school, so I thank her for bringing the debate to the chamber.
The figures in the motion that jumped out at me were that only 13 per cent of local authority areas in Scotland report having enough childcare for working parents and only 9 per cent can provide childcare for disabled children.
A point that I took from the Care Inspectorate report—I read a few reports in advance of the debate—was that 29 per cent of children in urban areas are attending early learning, compared with 13 per cent in remote rural areas. As an MSP for the Highlands and Islands, I think that many people are missing out simply because of transport and other issues.
As I am talking about missing out, I note that my colleague Liz Smith has spoken for many years about the fact that some people get six terms of free pre-school childcare while others get four terms. The figure of 600 hours a year for two years is misleading because, if a child is born between 1 March and the end of August, they will get six terms; if they are born between 1 September and the end of December, they will get five terms; and if they are born between 1 January and the last day of February, they will get four terms. That is odd, and I know that Liz Smith has pointed it out regularly. I had not appreciated that paragraph 68 of the statutory guidance says that arrangements
“to commence closer to the child’s third birthday are encouraged to support longer term aims to increase the amount of early learning”,
but I understand that that is at local authorities’ discretion. I further understand that they would not receive any additional funding for that. If we are looking for a fair system in which everybody gets two years of pre-school provision, we have to look at the additional funding.
In the report by the Family and Childcare Trust that Cara Hilton has mentioned regularly, the 13 per cent of local authorities in Scotland that provide enough childcare for working parents compare with 43 per cent in England. Iain Gray talked about catching up. We are not just 1 or 2 per cent behind England; England’s figure is three times higher than ours. I hope that the minister will address that issue today. I think that we are addressing that over the longer term.
When it comes to costing, George Adam mentioned more than 1,000 hours of provision, and Nicola Sturgeon has said that she would double childcare funding from £439 million to £880 million. Having spent five years in the Public Audit Committee, I ask how she knows that the cost will be £880 million. Will the cost be more? Will it be less? Where does that figure come from? If everyone was able to take up the childcare, it might cost a lot more. Just because the figure is doubled, that does not mean that it is an adequate figure to use.
In the short time that I have left in the debate, I will mention a hustings that I was at, probably less than a year ago. I heard that councils across Scotland pay varying rates for childcare to independent nurseries. Some nurseries were receiving £5 an hour for each child, and others were receiving less than £3.
That leads me to my next point. Another thing about this Parliament is that we have never ever properly valued the contribution that childcare, early years and nursery staff make. Those staff are more qualified and they are registered with the Scottish Social Services Council. The Care Inspectorate is rigorous in its inspections, and the quality of provision is excellent. We need to fund the councils and the councils need to fund the nurseries and, above all, we need to value the staff who look after children in Scotland day after day.
19:44
Like everyone else who has contributed this evening, I thank Cara Hilton for bringing this important debate to Parliament. Although we have differences, it is important—as she said in the closing remarks of her speech—that we work together on areas of commonality. Like Cara, I have a young family. You do not have to have a young family to understand the pressures of family life, but it is a practical, lived experience of the challenges that many people across the country face.
I am delighted to have an opportunity to debate childcare, because this Government has been ambitious in what it wants to do to ensure that all our children get the best possible start in life and that we can make a significant difference for future generations of families.
We have massively expanded early learning and childcare by almost half from 412.5 hours a year to 600 hours a year, and we have committed to almost doubling that to 1,140 hours a year by the end of the next session of Parliament. That is equivalent to the number of hours that a child spends at school. The reason why we focus on hours is that we want to ensure that the provision is configured in a much more flexible way, in response to what families need.
On the points that Iain Gray made on the costs of childcare, the cost of 25 hours and 50 hours a week of childcare is lower in every area in Scotland than is the case in England and the rest of the UK. Scotland’s childcare costs are lower, and we are trying to ensure that we are providing the resource that is necessary to help families even further.
We have fully funded that expansion, and have already invested £500 million in the first three years. Far from cutting expenditure, we have invested unprecedented levels of capital: £170 million to front load infrastructure changes, with local authorities receiving their final £30 million instalment in 2016-17, as agreed with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. It is absolutely vital that that full funding that is allocated by the Scottish Government is prioritised on the transformation that we seek over the next session of Parliament.
This is money well invested. With it, we are improving outcomes for all our children, especially those who will benefit most; supporting parents to work, train or study, especially those who need routes into sustainable employment; and reducing the burden of costs to parents, with an equivalent saving of £780 a year for those additional hours.
Our ambitions go beyond simply increasing hours. Our aim is to develop high-quality, flexible early learning and childcare that is affordable and accessible for all and is integrated with school and out-of-school care. That is why the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 introduced for the first time an entitlement for the 27 per cent of two-year-olds who will benefit most from early learning and childcare. That will make a significant contribution to closing the attainment gap and improving equality for all our children. That is also why we have introduced for the first time a requirement on local authorities to provide choice and flexibility, based on local consultations with parents, providing opportunities for employability support and family support.
If we are serious about giving children the best possible start in life, quality is non-negotiable. I agree that that does not have to be just about free hours; it must also be about quality and flexibility. That is why we are making early learning and childcare part of the learning journey from birth, integrated with the earlier stages of the curriculum for excellence; supporting the development of an early learning and childcare workforce, which is—in response to Mary Scanlon—highly valued and based on specialist skills; introducing additional graduates from 2018 to support children who will benefit most; creating a new standard of training and induction for childminders, so that they can become integral to our expansion of funded entitlements; continuing to fund the University of Aberdeen and the University of Strathclyde to deliver early years-specific masters qualifications for primary teachers, in order to provide opportunities for teachers to specialise; and providing £1 million to invest in pilots of different types of early learning and childcare, as a way of finding out what works well for children and families.
There is a significant range in the payments per hour, per child, from local authorities. I was quite shocked to learn that some were under £3 and some were over £5. If we value the workforce, surely nurseries have to be funded, in order to ensure that we financially value them, too. Is that something that the Government will consider?
I am not sure of the point that Mary Scanlon is making. I do not know whether she is talking about the workforce or the funding that goes to private nurseries, which is a cause of concern. We are considering that issue across the board. We have a financial review that is examining the costs of delivering childcare.
I am not sure whether Mary Scanlon’s point about the workforce concerned people’s pay and their terms and conditions, but we want to respond to the challenges that were set out by Professor Siraj when we commissioned her to consider issues around the workforce. We absolutely have to recognise that a child’s early years are their formative years, and that that workforce deals with children at a crucial point in their development. We need to speak loudly about the work that they do and ensure that they are recognised across the piece.
In less than three years, we have delivered significantly in making this transformation a reality. Last week, the Care Inspectorate published an initial overview of implementation from June 2013 onwards, which concluded that local authority efforts have been considerable and that local authorities have made significant achievements in making the new entitlements available. We are seeing improvement across local authorities. A number of local authorities are responding to parental demands regarding the way in which they want childcare to be delivered.
Local authorities are working with partners, including third sector and private providers, in a number of innovative ways. For instance, in the Highlands the Care and Learning Alliance—with which Mary Scanlon is perhaps familiar—is providing a wide range of innovative solutions and services in partnership with Highland Council. The Scottish Childminding Association is promoting childminding with a number of local authorities, to ensure that flexibility is there for the families with which it works. Early Years Scotland is developing playgroup solutions and support for the involvement of parents, for example in Dumfries and Galloway. The National Day Nurseries Association has developed forums and partnerships with local authorities across the country, with the result that the majority of local authorities no longer stipulate session times from private nurseries. Glasgow City Council is trialling holiday cover, as well as creating 500 new partner providers. Jobcentre Plus is working to promote higher uptake, for example in Inverclyde. East Lothian Council and Midlothian Council are promoting outreach work with parents. Many local authorities, such as Fife Council, which Cara Hilton talked about, are expanding and opening their own centres to full days, year round, with options for parents to purchase additional hours. Those are just some examples that are happening across the country.
We are not complacent. Although the changes that I have outlined are positive, challenges remain. Improvement on flexibility is on-going, but we need to be imaginative and innovative in the way in which we respond to the parenting challenges that exist for many families across the country. We need to continue to listen to and engage and work with parents, as partners, on how we configure and develop the additional hours that we want to roll out over the next parliamentary session. As George Adam said, the investment that we are making in this area is significant and considerable. It is a mark of the seriousness with which this Government treats childcare as a way to promote family cohesion and allow parents to find training or job opportunities.
The First Minister made it absolutely clear that the biggest transformational investment over the next parliamentary session will be not in a road or a bridge, but in the transformation of early learning and childcare, through which we will invest in the future of our children and families and create real equality of opportunity for the future of our country. That does not mean that we will demur from the challenges that exist, which we need to overcome. However, if we work together collectively and draw upon common areas of interest, we can make this transformation happen and, importantly, we can deliver for families and the children whom we want to have the best possible start in life.
Meeting closed at 19:52.Previous
Decision Time