30 hours free early education and childcare

Eligibility

The government has set the following eligibility criteria:

• Both parents must be working - or the sole parent is working in a lone parent family
• Each parent earns, on average, a weekly minimum equivalent to 16 hours at national minimum wage or national living wage
• Each parent must have an annual income of less than £100,000

More detailed information can be found on the GOV.UK website:

• Childcare Bill: policy statement - GOV.UK

Providing Childcare

You may be in a position to offer the 30 hours within your current service, you may have additional unused space you could convert to offer extra places or you may consider working in partnership with another childcare provider to offer the full 30 hours.

To limit the risks to providers, any changes to the current service you offer should be based on sound market research and planning with an eye on continued sustainability of your service. The Childcare Sufficiency Team has estimated the demand for the extra 15-hour places across Kirklees which is summarised with other useful information to help you with your planning:

• Childcare Sufficiency Assessment

Graduated 30 Hour Development Business Advice from the Childcare Sufficiency Team

The Childcare Sufficiency Team can offer a degree of business advice to providers interested in developing their capacity to offer 30 hours of FEEC to working parents but due to limited resources can only do so on a graduated basis. With this in mind we have published information, toolkits and links to other useful websites to allow providers with the initial steps through a self-help approach.

Some providers may not require any further assistance after accessing this information but others may. The expectancy is that you will have prepared a business plan (which need not be of great length) and carried out your own market research in your local area, then formed an idea of local need and how you might either alone or in partnership be thinking of an offer to parents. We have developed a template which can be modified to suit your particular situation:

• Parent survey template

Once you have carried out your thorough market research (including parent surveys) you will be in a better position to plan services which enhance the sustainability of your organisation whilst meeting the needs of working parents.