Agenda item

To provide an update on the 2020-21 Childcare Sufficiency Assessment to be submitted to the Executive Member and subsequently published on the Bracknell Forest Council Website, as required by the authority’s statutory duty to secure sufficient childcare.

The Forum considered a report which presented the 2020-21 Childcare Sufficiency Assessment (CSA).

Cherry Hall explained that the Early Years team at Bracknell Forest Council (BFC) have sought to better understand the market.  The team had good ideas last year, but this was impacted by the pandemic.  A lot of the work has continued but the outcomes look different to what had been anticipated as the numbers of children accessing childcare were lower.  However, providers had stayed open as much as they could within Government guidelines. 

The CSA shows that there was sufficient childcare across the Borough.  However, Cherry Hall wanted to understand more about the market in individual wards.  This data would help avoid putting new childcare provision in areas where there was already sufficient capacity.  Section 9 of the CSA showed the data by electoral ward.  The CSA identified how children were moving across boundaries.  Cherry Hall planned to speak to neighbouring authorities to ascertain how many BFC children were going out of area for childcare this had been delayed due to CV-19 but would be undertaken during the coming months

The CSA was not able to provide an absolute number of childcare places in BFC as it differed from day to day; providers adapting their capacity based on space and staffing requirements which were dependent on the age of the children attending.  Therefore, it was only possible to provide a snapshot of capacity at any one time. 

One of the priorities for 2021-22 was to identify and understand the changing childcare needs arising from the impact of the pandemic.  For example, the data suggested that more parents would be working from home.  Therefore, childcare providers were being supported to look at changing their business models to be sustainable; for example, having different opening hours and extending to holiday childcare.

Before and after school activities were severely impacted due to the pandemic.  There continued to be a need to identify any gaps to ensure working families were able to access childcare.  The Early Years team were actively promoting childcare and the range of options available. 

There had been a drop of 18 childminders last year and Cherry Hall had not seen any new provisions joining the market.  However, seven expressions of interest had recently been submitted to the team. 

The Early Years team were joining a pilot scheme with an organisation called ‘Famiio’ which was developing an app to signpost families to childcare solutions and to provide them with customised childcare plans.  The app was expected to provide real time information on childcare providers.

The Forum expressed on behalf of the childcare providers that they have felt well supported by Cherry Hall and the Early Years team during these unprecedented times.  Childcare providers had fed back that a member of the team was always available to provide advice and support. 

The Forum noted that Section 2 of the CSA highlighted that two group providers had reported financial difficulties and asked what had been provided for them.  Cherry Hall replied that the Early Years team were working with providers to see what else the team could help with.  Fully funded Business skills training had also been provided.  They were also looking at identifying more children who were eligible for two-year-old funding who were not accessing childcare.  No group providers have closed due to sustainability issues. 

The Chair enquired whether there was any funding transfer across borders.  Cherry Hall replied that the Census recorded all children attending providers in our area, regardless of where they live.  This had changed from the historical position.

The Forum asked, regarding EHCP funds, whether there was identification of children needing additional help.  Cherry Hall responded that she worked closely with the Special Education Needs and Disabilities team.  The Early Years team also provided an inclusion fund for emerging needs which provided support to settings.  The inclusion fund panel looked at the needs of the children and would intervene early but only instigate the Statutory Assessment process when it was needed. 

The Forum quoted a paragraph from Section 2 of the CSA which stated that “[providers] who remained open and accepted vulnerable children or children of keyworkers from closed settings and as a result the number of children attending their setting exceeded the funded places for the term were able to claim additional funding.” The Forum questioned whether there was any double reporting.  Cherry Hall confirmed that a small number would have been double reporting.  In most situations, when children moved to another setting, they were able to use pre-paid places.  However, if children were eligible for 30 hours funded childcare, most would go from nursery to childminders who did not have pre-paid places, so the childminders received top-up funding.  Paul Clark added that there were sufficient funds in the budget to meet early years commitments. 

The Forum asked Cherry Hall whether she was expecting a further drop in participation in Autumn 2021 from providers that cannot weather the storm, or whether the current level could be maintained.  Cherry Hall replied that she was hoping that the position could be maintained as this term the average attendance was between 1300 and 1500 a day.  This showed that children were returning to provisions. 

The Forum noted that data was unavailable for breakfast and after-school clubs and asked whether that was because it was a fluid number or because of a lack of any mechanism to collect up-to-date information.  Cherry Hall replied that both were factors.  Lots of these clubs didn’t run due to the pandemic.  It was hoped that the new app would be able to keep more real-time data.

The Chair expressed that there was clear linkage between the CSA and the school places plan.  The Chair hoped that some of the work Cherry Hall’s team has been doing with the SEND provision fed into the work Kashif Nawaz was responsible for (Kashif Nawaz confirmed that the SEN section was firmly embedded within the school places plan).  Together, the three documents provided useful information for BFC.  Chris Hilliard added that he has worked in several Local Authorities and this was the first time he had heard of all the key areas being integrated into one.  Chris Hilliard felt that this approach further strengthened BFC discussions with the DfE. 

Cherry Hall added that she had started working with the SEND team and the Child Development Centre to move forward with collating SEN data.  Cherry Hall was expecting to be able to report to the Forum on how this was moving forward after a couple of terms. 

Action: Cherry Hall

Kashif Nawaz reiterated that the Sub Group would be learning from the data and identifying emerging needs as opposed to just taking a rigid statistical approach. 

The Chair thanked Cherry Hall and her team on behalf of the Forum for the work that had gone into the CSA and the report which provided a useful summary. 

RESOLVED to NOTE the 2020-21 Childcare Sufficiency Assessment.