Clause 6 - Duty to secure sufficient childcare for working parents
Childcare Bill
1:30 pm
Tim Loughton (Shadow Minister (Children), Health; East Worthing and Shoreham, Conservative)
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for making my job even harder by zipping on to another clause. She raises a point that I mentioned earlier and that is inherent in some of the other amendments that we propose, which is that the situation is dynamic. We should assess and plan for child care not only on the basis of the position today, but on the basis of what the position will be over the next few years. Clearly, a constant review of that will be necessary.
The amendment addresses how an outside body can challenge the judgment, and it is a judgment, particularly in the absence of quite strict criteria for what satisfies sufficiency. There are concerns among the various independent nursery groups that local authorities are not paying sufficient heed to existing nursery provision and are going ahead and setting up their own nursery provision, as they are allowed to as a last resort. That will be detrimental to existing provision. Much of the provision in this country is provided by private and voluntary independent nurseries. It seems right that there should be some mechanism to empower those existing, recognised, established and registered quality providers to challenge the decision made by a local authority.
Much legislation that we scrutinise has a system of checks and balances whereby the body being regulated or the industry being overseen is entitled, through a recognised mechanism, to challenge a judgment, particularly when it has a material effect on their business. I do not have the details of how such a system should be set up in this respect, but a form of appeals process should be inherent in the Bill, for use by an existing or an independent provider that is investing in an area, if it thinks that it is not being given the opportunity to work properly in partnership with the local authority.
The terminology of much of the Bill is rightly about partnership between the local authority and a whole host of other providers, but if a private and voluntary independent provider feels that it is getting a raw deal, what can it do? It can make a fuss, it can criticise the local authority, but what can it achieve? I cannot see any other provision for such a situation, except that the provider can make representations to the local authority, which is judge and jury in determining the sufficiency within the criteria that are set down by the Secretary of State. It is also judge and jury for reviewing those criteria and how they are panning out in practice over whatever period of years the reviews will take place. I cannot see a formal mechanism whereby a private and voluntary independent provider, or any other sort of provider, independent of the local authority, can challenge the basis on which the authority seeks to define some of the rather indeterminate phrases in the Bill.
Amendment No. 100 therefore simply calls for some form of appeals mechanism to be put in place. Obviously we would want to see the details of that mechanism, and one would hope that the Secretary of State, if she were minded to take the amendment on board, would publish proposals.
It should also be made clear what sanctions should apply when the local authority is found not to be acting in accordance with the statutory requirements and, in this case, not acting in true partnership with the other potential providers that are involved in producing child care places. That is the basis of the amendment, and the principle applies to much of the other legislation that we have scrutinised.
I will defer to my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton on amendment No. 4, which again tries to tease out further detail of how a local authority can carry out fair and balanced research to come to the conclusion that it is overseeing the provision of sufficient levels of child care in its area. There are some strict criteria on which he will elaborate if he catches your eye, Mr. Benton.
Amendment No. 239 again refers to the subject of disabled children. The principles behind the amendment, which my hon. Friend and I have been happy to take on board, come from Mencap. It says in support of the amendment:
“Disabled children are likely to be less independent than non-disabled children, and to require childcare for longer, as the Bill recognises by securing childcare for non-disabled children up to the age of 14 and for disabled children up to the age of 16. However, while it is reasonable to suppose that a 14 year old non-disabled child will be sufficiently independent not to require childcare, there is no good reason to suppose that a disabled child’s need for childcare will end at the age of 16. This amendment would ensure that childcare is secured for all disabled children, whatever their age.
Securing childcare for disabled children only up to 16 years leaves a crucial gap for 17 and 18 year olds, who may not be able to access adult services but are too old to access childcare. Half of all families with a disabled child are living in poverty or on the margin of poverty. Childcare costs twice as much for parents of disabled children compared with parents of non-disabled children.
Parents of children up to the age of 18 have the right to request flexible working hours in order to meet their care needs. The recognition elsewhere that disabled children have particular care needs up to the age of 18 should be reflected in the Childcare Bill.”
I have a great deal of sympathy with that intention. Hon. Members mentioned the extra costs and attention required in looking after disabled children. The amendment recognises that disability does not become different at the age of 16, and that while such children are still classified as children up to the age of 18, the special measures should pertain.
Amendment No. 80 goes back to not limiting the availability of child care to those receiving the child care element of the child tax credit. I shall not reopen that at this stage as we shall come back to it when we debate the relevant clauses.
We then come to the amendments that I can group together because they all refer to the Welsh section of the Bill in clause 22. They mirror those that we tabled on English authorities and would apply in relation to the powers that are available in the Bill, rather than those that are held by the Welsh Assembly. Without going into further detail, that covers amendments Nos.d¤249, 250, 253 to 255, 261 to 263 and 267.
Amendment No. 200, which will be dealt with by my hon. Friend, relates to statutory instruments.
New clause 9 relates to my earlier point about appeals. It states that an English local authority must establish an appeals mechanism to enable parents who are unable to access childcare under the terms set out in clause 6 to require the local authority to reassess the sufficiency of provision. The new clause contains a typing error, as it repeats the word “sufficiency”. It is intended to be probing.
Just as other providers should have a mechanism for challenging the judgments of the local authority, surely so should the customers, namely the parents. If a local authority declares that it has done enough to provide sufficient places, but a parent is still having difficulty accessing child care despite the criteria set out for sufficiency, there should be a mechanism by which parents can complain that they are not receiving the service that the authority is obliged, under the statutory duty in the Bill, to provide. I am not advocating a highly prescriptive system for setting up such an appeals system, but, just as there is an appeals mechanism on access to schools, there should be a system whereby parents can question the judgment of a local authority on the sufficient and appropriate provision of child care places.
We must secure proper checks and balances for alternative providers who feel that their livelihood is being challenged unfairly and for those parents who feel that the legislation has not achieved its aims. We do not seek a highly prescriptive system with people making challenges at every juncture, but there must be a fall-back position if parents are still having problems accessing the child care that the Bill is intended to provide.
That is a rather long tour d’horizon of the 30 amendments and one new clause that I have pleasure in recommending to the Committee.