Labour has called on the Government to focus its financial support on the struggling childcare sector to prevent a wave of nursery closures and a damaging impact on families and our economic recovery.
During a visit to a nursery today,Tulip Siddiq MP, Shadow Minister for Children and Early Years, will warn that allowing mass childcare closures could lead to many parents, particularly mothers, losing their jobs, setting back our economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic which will rely on people being able to get back to work.
1718 childcare providers have already been lost in the North West region since 2015, and research suggests that a quarter of the rest may not survive this crisis.
Labour is calling for the early years sector to receive the targeted support it needs, to help providers cope with substantially reduced income and higher costs during this pandemic, for which no specific support is currently available.
Tulip Siddiq MP, Labour’s Shadow Minister for Children and Early Years, said:
“Childcare is absolutely essential for working parents and to our economic recovery from coronavirus. But it has been ignored by the Government in this crisis, with the early years sector consistently excluded from support packages.
“We have already lost 1718 nurseries, childminders and other childcare providers in the North West in the last five years due to underfunding. We can’t afford for any more to close, but that is precisely what will happen unless the Government targets support properly on sectors like childcare.
“It’s time for Ministers to get serious about supporting families in this pandemic and step in with a proper plan to save the childcare sector.”
