After the sometimes sensationalist reports in the national press last week about 'nurseries turning children into thugs', the early years sector and the Government need to give a clear message to parents about what high-quality provision is, what the effects on children in different forms of childcare are, how significant those effects are, and how high-quality care will be funded. Reports that the Government was making a U-turn on its strategy of funding childcare places in favour of increasing maternity and paternity benefits were not borne out by the five-year plan released by the DfES (see News, page 4). The principle of making it easier for parents to stay at home in the first couple of years of their baby's life has met with general approval - apart from employers' organisations. But daycare places will continue to be a major plank of the Government's childcare strategy. What we need to know is that there will be enough funding to create places of sufficient quality, staffed by well-trained, decently paid practitioners.
After the sometimes sensationalist reports in the national press last week about 'nurseries turning children into thugs', the early years sector and the Government need to give a clear message to parents about what high-quality provision is, what the effects on children in different forms of childcare are, how significant those effects are, and how high-quality care will be funded.
Reports that the Government was making a U-turn on its strategy of funding childcare places in favour of increasing maternity and paternity benefits were not borne out by the five-year plan released by the DfES (see News, page 4). The principle of making it easier for parents to stay at home in the first couple of years of their baby's life has met with general approval - apart from employers' organisations. But daycare places will continue to be a major plank of the Government's childcare strategy. What we need to know is that there will be enough funding to create places of sufficient quality, staffed by well-trained, decently paid practitioners.
Debate about what children need is healthy. But creating panic among parents that their children will all become aggressive monsters if they go to nursery is not the way forward.
