Current status: Answered by Natalie Don-Innes on 27 March 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what proportion of eligible children have accessed their full entitlement of 1,140 hours of funded childcare in each of the last three years.
All three- and four-year-olds, as well as eligible two-year-olds, have a statutory entitlement of up to 1140 hours per year of funded ELC.
The most recent ELC Census shows that uptake of the funded ELC offer for 3- and 4-year-olds was around 95% of eligible children in 2024. For eligible 2-year-olds, the proportion was 59%.
According to Improvement Service data in September 2024, around 98% of children aged 3 or more receiving funded ELC in September 2024 were reported to be accessing more than 600 funded hours, and 89% were reported to be accessing the full 1140 funded hours. This data also shows around 92% of eligible 2-year-olds reported to be receiving funded ELC in September 2024 were reported to be accessing more than 600 funded hours, and around 77% were reported to be accessing the full 1140 funded hours.
Data for previous years on the number of eligible children accessing funded ELC is available from summary statistics, available here: Early learning and childcare statistics - gov.scot.
Data for previous years (reported quarterly) on the proportion of children accessing funded ELC who have used the full 1140 hours in previous years is available from Improvement Service reports, available here: ELC data collections, reporting and analysis | Improvement Service.