With you, with the child. Every step of the way.
Broadcast for Early Years and childcare providers in West Sussex from West Sussex County Council - Early Help Service
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Monday 20 April 2020
Welcome back to another school term. This will be an unusual summer term and we don't yet know when and how life will return to normal. We hope that you have a rewarding term knowing that you are contributing to the effort to keep families safe and well and also creating some positive experiences for young children during this time.
The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) opens today
The government has announced changes on Friday 17 April to the requirements for early years providers’ access to the Job Retention Scheme. These changes may make it more challenging for some providers to access and benefit from the scheme.
This guidance sets out the financial support that is available for different types of education, early years and children’s social care providers in England.
The early years section of the new guidance confirms that a private provider should only furlough employees, and therefore seek support through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS), if they meet the following conditions:
- the employee works in an area of business where services are temporarily not required and where their salary is not covered by public funding;
- the employee would otherwise be made redundant or laid off;
- the employee is not involved in delivering provision that has already been funded (free entitlement funding);
- (where appropriate) the employee is not required to deliver provision for a child of a critical worker and/or vulnerable child; and
- the grant from the CJRS would not be duplicative to other public grants received and would not lead to financial reserves being created.
If it is difficult to distinguish whether staff are funded through free entitlement or private income for the purposes of meeting the first three conditions as listed above, then an early years provider can access the CJRS to cover up to the proportion of its paybill which could be considered to have been paid for from that provider’s private income.
This would typically be income received from ‘parent-paid’ hours, and excludes all income from the government’s free entitlements (or ‘DSG income’) for all age groups. The guidance includes an illustration of how this would work in practice.
The revised guidance can be found in full here. Please make sure you read this guidance carefully to understand the expectations on early years providers to ensure that any claims you make are in line with government guidelines. The document gives specific guidance to early years providers about how they should apply the scheme alongside the use of FE funding which is still provided.
Details on how to make your applications are available here.
Updates to Business Rates Relief Information
The government have issued an update regarding EY data for the business rates relief discount in two tier areas. On 18 March 2020, in response to COVID-19, the government announced that many childcare providers would pay no business rates in 2020 to 2021. This relief will be administrated by district and borough councils and we have already supplied them with details of settings to which this will apply.
Reminder about settings reopening
If you have been closed and will be reopening after the Easter Holidays, please keep us informed by emailing family.info.service@westsussex.gov.uk
Updates to Government's Early Years and Childcare Guidance
The Guidance on Social Distancing in Childcare settings was updated on 7 April with information on personal, protective equipment in early years and childcare settings.
The Early Years and Childcare Closures Guidance was updated on 15 April to include:
- Proposals for temporary flexibility on a small number of requirements in the Early Years Foundation Stage statutory framework. These proposals are subject to parliamentary agreement and, until then, the current EYFS requirements continue to apply.
- New content on the Government’s position on personal protective equipment for early years staff.
- Some flexibility on identifying children as vulnerable if they are on the edges of receiving children's social care support and those who have been referred but have not yet been appointed a social worker.
Updated guidance for parents and carers on the closure of educational settings
The guidance for parents and carers on the closure of educational settings has been updated with additional information on the resources and support available to help parents educate their children at home.
Starting School 2020
The majority of families should have been informed last week of the offered place for their child for September 2020. If you become aware of any family with a child due to start school in September 2020 who have not applied for a school place, please ask them to contact the Pupil Admissions Team on 033 301 42903 as soon as possible to apply for a place.
The Starting School Questionnaire is open until 1 May 2020 and can be accessed here.
EYFS assessments for children starting school in September 2020 were being collected in the spring term. If you have any assessments for this cohort that have not yet been submitted, please email these to IntegratedReviews@westsussex.gov.uk. Please refer to the guidance available here.
Bank Holiday on Friday 8 May
As I'm sure you are aware, 8 May is a bank holiday to mark the VE Day Anniversary - rather than the usual bank holiday on the first Monday in May. In order to support us to plan childcare provision for children that need it on this day, please can you speak to the families you have currently attending and identify if any of them will need childcare provision on that day. If you have families that need it, and you will not be able to provide that childcare, please can you send an email to family.info.service@westsussex.gov.uk adding "Bank Holiday" to the subject line. Please include details of any children in need of childcare that you are unable to provide, the reason for access (vulnerable child or child of a critical worker) and the hours that they need care for. This will help us to gather the information we need to make sure that they have access to the provision that they need.
Future Broadcasts
For the last few weeks, we have been giving you daily updates through the broadcast to support you in these changing and uncertain times. As we are moving into a new, slightly more settled phase of the partial closure of early years and childcare provision, we will be reviewing the frequency and timings of these broadcasts. We will, of course, ensure that any significant changes are communicated with you as quickly as possible.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) - including links to Gov.UK information
Please note: We are reviewing our FAQs and streamlining the document to make it easier for you to use, and will publish the new document when ready. Whilst we are reviewing the current FAQs, we will make any necessary updates to existing answers. You can still submit any new questions you have for us by email family.info.service@westsussex.gov.uk, adding COVID-19 setting query to the subject line.
Please ensure that you additionally refer to the latest Government FAQs on Gov.UK
Reminder: Data capture survey required every Wednesday and Friday
All providers please complete a short online survey, twice a week, every Wednesday and Friday. The link to the survey is different each time. A link will be provided in the morning broadcast on each of the days it is required. Each survey will only be open on the day it is required, and will close at midnight.
Links to our most recent COVID-19 setting updates:
17/4 Update 23 (Lockdown extension, Friday survey open, celebrating work)
16/4 Update 22 (Starting school offers, furlough eligibility change)
15/4 Update 21 (update on keeping staff safe, employment and furloughing)
14/4 Update 20 (clarification on survey about vulnerable children and children of critical workers)
9/4 Update 19 (childminders to support delivery of childcare, and support for vulnerable families)
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