Schools encouraged to take 2-year-olds to tackle childcare crisis
I am not sure we have got this right. In Scandinavia very successful children don’t start school till 7! It seems to me to be about our culture of increasingly long working hours and the thin end of a long wedge which will sacrifice childcare at home to more “in work poverty”
Schools will be encouraged to take children as young as two to help solve the country’s child care crisis.
Liz Truss, the education minister, is writing to every council in England to suggest that school nurseries should extend their opening hours to allow parents to leave toddlers during the working day.
The Government is also introducing legislation to reduce red tape and make it easier for schools to open their doors to two-year-olds.
Ministers believe that opening up the system will help provide tens of thousands more child care places, which are urgently needed in many areas.
It will also enable mothers to go back into part-time work and help prevent children from disadvantaged backgrounds from slipping behind.