Why we should scrap the six-week summer

A shortage of registered childcare places has pushed up the cost of summer holiday play schemes in England by more than ten per cent in the past year, according to new research.

With the average cost of a place for a child in a holiday play scheme now standing at £87.43 a week, many working parents are struggling to find alternative childcare for their children during the six-week summer break.

Emma Knight, joint chief executive the Daycare Trust, which conducted the survey, said that the findings showed that summer holiday childcare remained well beyond the reach of many families.

Some holiday play schemes cost as much as £105 a week, nearly a quarter of the national median weekly pay of £457 and more than the average £95 spent weekly on food and household bills.

Ms Knight said that parents should not be put in a position of having to choose between earning money to support their family and stopping work to care for their children.

“It is deeply worrying that parents are reporting a lack of holiday childcare provision and that average prices are rising well above inflation pushing the costs beyond the reach of poorer families,” she said.

She added that the 10.1 per cent increase in England was the biggest year-on-year jump in holiday childcare costs since 2003 when the typical cost rose by 15.8 per cent.

Despite massive public and private sector investment in childcare over the past decade, the survey found that there are still not enough summer holiday childcare places to go round.

More than a half (51 per cent) of the 144 local authority Family Information Services (FIS) in the UK that took part in the survey said there were insufficient places in their area.

A quarter of FISs in England and Wales and 14 per cent in Scotland said there had been a decrease in the number of summer holiday childcare places.

There were big gaps in holiday childcare for youngsters aged 12 years and over and children with disabilities, with 64 and 54 per cent of survey respondents reporting a lack of sufficient childcare for these groups respectively.

The survey also found wide regional differences in the cost of play schemes. The average weekly cost in inner London, where councils have traditionally provided childcare subsidies, is £68.25, but it rises to £105.04 in the East of England and to 101.03 in the South East.

Beverley Hughes, the Children’s Minister, acknowledged that the cost of childcare, after school and holiday clubs could be expensive for parents. But she said the government was spending £3.5m a day through tax credits to support parents with these costs.

“Parents can get up to 80 per cent of their childcare costs back in tax credits each week, including during the school holidays, which is why we’re urging them to make sure that they are claiming all the financial help available to them,” she said.

The Daycare Trust said that take up of the childcare element of tax credit was low because the system was too complicated.

The charity said that urgent action was needed to increase the supply of childcare both for this summer and for the autumn, when new laws come into force requiring lone parents of children over the age of 12 to make themselves available for work or risk losing benefits.

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