Pre-school and early years childcare and education survey

For your views on how accessible and affordable pre-school and early years education and childcare is at present and what the barriers to accessing effective early years provision are and how these can be overcome.

A total of 307 responses were received

• 303 (98.7%) of the responses were received were from those adults who have main or shared responsibility for making decisions about childcare or nursery/pre school education for at least one child aged 5 or under living in their household
• 4 responses (1.3%) were not

All responses received were online.

When asked about adequacy of provision you said

• 3-4 year olds – 19% of parents/carers found it very difficult or fairly difficult to find provision
• 2-3 year olds – 33% of parents/carers found it very difficult or fairly difficult to find provision
• 0-2 year olds – 68% of parents/carers found it very difficult or fairly difficult to find provision

Barriers to accessing provision

For those who found it very difficult or fairly difficult to find a place for your child

• 22% said it was due to lack of places  
• 20% said that there was an issue with places for under 2’s
• 15% said it was the expense 

Increase the value of pre school credits providing a universal credit of £3,420 per annum.

Extend the pre school voucher to include registered child-minders.

Share information with providers in order to monitor the capacity of settings to provide sufficient places.

Work with the Department of Health and Social Care Registrations and Inspections Unit to inspect the quality of education provided within all early years settings.

Work with the Department of Infrastructure to explore the possibility of making other government buildings available for tender in order to provide additional early years provision.