Reminder
Please take part in the Early Years Provider Survey Autumn 2024
This is particularly important as it includes questions about Childcare Sufficiency in your area in preparation for the expansion of childcare places in September 2025 when eligible children of working parents aged 9 months to 2 years will increase to 30 hours per week.
We are also seeking your views on:
- PVI and childminder early years funding payment schedule
- Safeguarding
- Children with additional needs
- Recruitment and retention
- CPD and training
The deadline for responses is Friday 15th November 2024.
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
The national wraparound childcare programme is part of the childcare reforms announced at the 2023 Spring Budget. The government’s ambition is that by 2026, all parents and carers of primary school-aged children who need it will be able to access term time childcare in their local area from 8am-6pm. This programme will only focus on primary school-aged children from reception to year 6, Monday to Friday during term time. The expectation is that all wraparound provision is 8am-6pm, enabling parents to work a full day with travel time, unless data shows that local demand is for different hours, for example reflecting local labour market patterns.
Westmorland and Furness Council would like to capture the views of parents, carers and families by inviting them to complete a survey to help us shape and support wraparound childcare in Westmorland and Furness to meet the needs of children, parents, carers and families.
Please share the following survey links with parents, carers and families of your setting/school. Wraparound Childcare Parent Survey 2024
Funding available to support Wraparound provision
If you wish to expand your current wraparound offer in your school, by extending hours, increasing places or creating a new provision then please email with your interest to the following email address and someone will contact you with further information; wraparoundprog.WAF@cumbria.gov.uk
From 1 September, over 300,000 eligible parents in England started accessing 15 hours childcare for 9 month olds as part of the second phase of the childcare support expansion.
Working parents in England, can apply for their childcare codes for:
- 15 hours childcare per week for children aged between 9 months old until they turn 3, over 38 weeks of the year.
- 30 hours childcare per week for 3 or 4 year olds, over 38 weeks of the year.
https://www.gov.uk/apply-free-childcare-if-youre-working
Please remind families that the deadline to apply for a code is 31 December to use from 1 January.
Families who are receiving some form of additional government support such as some parents on Universal Credit, or if their child has an Education, Health and Care plan, can also get 15 hours childcare for their 2-year-old.
If a family is eligible for both the working entitlement and the 15 hours for families receiving support, they can’t take up both offers and should apply for the 15 hours for families receiving support.
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On rare occasions, parents may receive suspicious texts, calls or emails purporting to be from HMRC or the Childcare Service. Parents may be asked to supply personal information such as income, national insurance numbers or email addresses.
Please be advised that it may sometimes be necessary for the Childcare Service to contact parents directly in order to progress applications/reconfirmations, follow up on mandatory reviews/appeals and also as part of the standard customer compliance activity. However, the Childcare Service will only contact parents from numbers beginning 0300 or from a caller ID showing as withheld.
If parents are concerned about any communication, they receive which claims to be from the Childcare Service, they can contact the Childcare Service helpline directly on 0300 123 4097 to discuss their application/childcare account.
If they suspect the call, email or text they received is fraudulent, they could consider sending this onto HMRC to help end scams like these. More information can be seen at Report suspicious HMRC emails, text messages and phone calls - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The government’s response to the consultation on proposed changes to strengthen EYFS safeguarding requirements, which ran from 22 April 2024 to 17 June 2024.
Changes to Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) safeguarding requirements: September 2025
The early years foundation stage (EYFS) statutory framework is mandatory for all early years settings. It sets the standards that all early years providers must meet to ensure that children learn and develop well, and are kept healthy and safe.
What you need to do
From 1 September 2025, all registered early years providers must follow the new EYFS framework. Whatever your role and type of setting you work in, you’ll need to be working to the new framework.
Ahead of then, make sure you understand what is changing and how this might impact your practice.
The consultation outcome can be found on the Early years Foundation Stage (EYFS) safeguarding reforms page. This sets out the new EYFS wording and will help you understand the changes you will need to make.
We have also created a Summary of EYFS changes and published a vodcast.
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The DfE have announced new flexibilities for Childminders from the 1st November. The new flexibilities will:
- Create a new category of Childminder (childminder without domestic premises) who work entirely from non-domestic premises
- Increase, from 3 to 4, the total number of people that can work together under a Childminder’s registration (including the childminder)
- Give Childminders and providers of childcare on domestic premises (CODPs) more flexibility, allowing them to spend more time operating outside of domestic premises, such as a community hall or school
- Increase the number of people needed for CODPs to operate from 4 or more, to 5 or more people providing care (CODPs that were registered, or applied to register, before 1 November can continue operating with 4 or more people)
- Newsflash – New Flexibilities for Childminders (printfriendly.com)
EYFS statutory framework for childminders (publishing.service.gov.uk)
Parenta are offering a FREE webinar exclusively for childminders, covering the upcoming changes to childminder funding and regulations.
When: Thursday 7th November at 6:30pm via teams
click here to register
Foundation Years has released a new vodcast on ‘Safer Sleeping Practices for Early Years Educators’. This informative vodcast explores a series of best practice questions with the DfE and The Lullaby Trust, sharing up-to-date guidance on creating safe sleep environments for children aged 0-5.
The vodcast explores essential topics such as sleeping arrangements and positions guidelines, how to keep a baby’s temperature at a safe and comfortable level, smoking risks and more.
Watch the vodcast and read the supporting guides by visiting the Foundation Years website
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