Rutland Early Years Agency Limited (REYAL), which is one of the largest childminder agencies in the country, was first rated ineffective in all areas by Ofsted towards the end of last year, leaving local authorities considering withdrawing funding from hundreds of childminder members.
Nursery World reported in February this year, when the inspection report was published, that the agency had approximately 766 members across 109 local authorities.
Following its inspection between October and November last year, Rutland was re-inspected in June. Again, Ofsted rated the agency ineffective in all areas.
The Department for Education told Nursery World that it is 'doing everything it can to support those affected by the closure of the Rutland childminder agency, and to make sure everyone who wants to do so is able to stay in the profession.'
Ofsted report
The Ofsted report, published yesterday (6 September), states that ‘Leaders have not ensured all childminders registered with them have received a statutory annual quality assurance visit. The agency’s records indicate this affects around 10 per cent of their childminders. The length of time visits are overdue varies between a few weeks to more than two years.’
Also, that ‘Leaders are placing too much confidence in the assessments made of childminder’s practice under their previous framework, which was judged to not be effective at the prior inspection.’
Following the re-inspection and an unsuccessful appeal against the Ofsted judgement, Rutland Early Years Agency has notified its existing 728 members of its closure at the end of November.
In a statement, Rutland Early Years said it had taken the ‘heartbreaking decision to close after eight years in business.’
The agency added that it had ‘appealed what it believes may have been a flawed inspection process’, but had retained its ineffective grading.
See below for the statement in full.
The news comes after the former children’s minister last month urged housing associations and landlords to remove clauses in leases that prevent childminders from working from home, in a bid to boost the numbers working in the profession.
And, the introduction of a Government financial incentive to new childminders who join the profession, with those joining agencies receiving more than those who register with Ofsted independently.
The impact of the agency's closure
According to Childminding UK, a charity that supports childminders, some of Rutland's 728 members are individually registered with Ofsted and use it as a membership organisation. 
Its operations manager, Tina Maltman (pictured right) told Nursery World that members of the agency who are not individually registered with the inspectorate must now do so or register with another agency in order to continue to run their business.
She went on to warn, ‘The implications of this are that many will lose the ability to provide funded places if they can’t re-register before the end of November when Rutland closes. If they can’t re-register in time, they will not be registered childminders. They will have to stop practicing and providing their valuable service for parents and children, while their livelihoods will be lost.’
Childminding UK said Ofsted has told them that it will track applications for registration from former Rutland childminders to make sure the process runs as quickly as possible.
However, Maltman said there could be a delay with registration as security checks and DBS will need completing again.
Childminding UK is running a free virtual event new Wednesday evening (13 September) to help those impacted by the closure of Rutland Early Years Agency.
Rutland Early Years Agency’s statement in full
A spokesperson for the agency, one of seven childminder agencies currently operating in England, said, ‘After eight years, having grown our agency to become the biggest in the UK, we have taken the heartbreaking decision to close Rutland Early Years.‘Unfortunately, despite a lengthy appeal following what we believe may have been a flawed inspection process, Rutland has received an ineffective grading from Ofsted. We are devastated by this outcome.
‘The grading brings with it ongoing uncertainty to our community and financial pressures to Rutland as a business. These factors, combined with a lack of urgency from the Government to address the regulatory blockers stopping CMAs from operating on a level playing field, means we feel we have no choice but to close.‘We put our hearts and souls into creating Rutland. We are incredibly proud of what we built and of every single one of the 700 childminders in our brilliant community. They offer excellent early years education to thousands of children across England.
‘Our priority now is them. We will remain open until the end of November to support our community as they transition their registrations to new providers and will continue to offer our unwavering support to them as we complete this process.’
'We are now doing everything we can' - DfE
A Department for Education spokesperson said, 'While it is right that Ofsted holds childminder agencies to account, we are now doing everything we can to support those affected by the closure of the Rutland childminder agency, and want to make sure everyone who wants to do so is able to stay in the profession.
'We have written to local authorities to encourage them to continue to fund Rutland’s childminders right through its closure on 30th November, and encourage everyone registered at Rutland to act now to secure their future registration, either with Ofsted or another agency.
'We are also asking everyone involved in the registration process, including local authorities and Ofsted to quickly process the necessary checks for childminders re-registering from Rutland.'
Commenting on the news of Rutland Early Years Agency’s closure, James Hemspall, director of Hempsalls, said, ‘It is vital local authorities take a pragmatic approach throughout in supporting the transitioning childminders from Rutland CMA to their new working arrangements via Ofsted or another CMA.
‘This will help protect children, parents and childminders during this period of change. As happened earlier in the year, following the first ineffective inspection outcome, I certainly would like to see funding continued for childminders to avoid any unnecessary impacts on continuity of care.’
- Have you been impacted by the impending closure of Rutland childminding agency? If so, email news.nw@markallengroup.com