Following protests from a number of PVI providers, KCC has suspended new conditions for the NEG and is understood to be challenging the DfES on a number of issues within the CoP.
Providers are awaiting an official statement from KCC. A council spokesperson told Nursery World, 'We are waiting for a response from the DfES and for points to be clarified.'
But Darrell King, owner of the Old School House nursery in East Sutton, Kent, said, 'Both myself and parents have received letters of encouragement from all levels within the council.'
But children's minister Beverly Hughes told Nursery World, 'I am firmly committed to the free entitlement which this Government has introduced. It is absolutely crucial that this free offer of 12.5 hours childcare a week remains just that, free to all parents at the point of delivery.
'That the entitlement should be free has always been our position. Our recent guidance reiterated this again explicitly. We will not entertain the idea of top-up payments for toddlers and we will not allow the creation of a two-tier system between those who can afford to pay these additional fees and those who cannot.'
Ms Hughes said that the Government was funding the free entitlement with around 3bn a year, including 82m a year for local authorities to support PVI providers to deliver the 38-week entitlement.
She added, 'As the free entitlement has been rolled out, the greatest expansion of places has been in private, voluntary and independent providers. Of all children accessing the free entitlement in 2005, 40 per cent did so in PVI settings, compared to just 17 per cent in 2000.'