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Disabled childcare is dear and scarce

Nearly 70 per cent of parents with disabled children have difficulty finding childcare and it can cost up to three times more than provision for children without disabilities, a report from the Daycare Trust revealed last week. The report, Everyone Counts, found that parents of disabled children relied on word of mouth to find specialist childcare which 'often appears to fall into gaps between local authority, health, education, leisure and social services'.

The report, Everyone Counts, found that parents of disabled children relied on word of mouth to find specialist childcare which 'often appears to fall into gaps between local authority, health, education, leisure and social services'.

The Trust, which jointly hosted a conference with the National Childminding Association (NCMA) last week to press for Government action, said that there is 'a massive shortfall' in childcare services for the UK's 720,000 disabled children and 1.9 million children with special educational needs.

Nancy Platts, the Trust's head of policy and campaigns, said, 'If we want to improve access to early education and childcare services for disabled children and their families, then services need to be more affordable, more available, more accessible and more integrated.'

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