Clause 11 - Duty to assess childcare provision
Childcare Bill
4:00 pm
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire, Liberal Democrat)
I am sorry that I was not present at the beginning of the debate this morning. It is a pleasure to speak to amendment No. 304, which relates to part 2 of the Bill on child care provision in Wales. It would give an element of parent power to the parents of children in local authorities in Wales. After an assessment of the sufficiency or appropriateness of the amount of child care in an area, things would change, almost from the day of the assessment. The amendment would bring changes in local circumstances to the attention of the local authority; a request could be made to reassess whether child care was sufficient.
The issue was brought to my attention recently when parents in a community were unable to get access to child care because a bus service had been taken away. As a result, all the parents who did not have a car or access to a car could not get to the facility that had been available. A question arises from that, given the local authority duty under the Bill to provide an assessment. There would be a huge difference in the facilities available to those families. The amendment would therefore enable parents to tell the local authority that there had been a material change in their circumstances and ask it, before the next full assessment in two or three years or whatever the Assembly might require, to take matters in hand and carry out an assessment immediately.