The Conservatives have costed the doubling of free childcare for three- and four-year-olds at £350 million a year, while the Alliance’s independent research has put the figure at three times that, at 1.5 billion at current rates.
Early years funding should also be ringfenced within the Dedicated Schools Grant, it says.
The Alliance has set out its next steps following the Government’s confirmation of a funding review of the free entitlement and the setting up of a taskforce to deliver on the plans for 30 hours of childcare for working parents of three-and four-year-olds.
Earlier this week the Prime Minister announced that the scheme would be piloted from September 2016, a year earlier than the Conservatives' pre-election pledge.
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