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Schools should be open to 6pm to reduce the burden of childcare on working parents

The school day could be lengthened and parents drafted in to run after-hour clubs to reduce the burden of childcare on working mothers and fathers, the government is proposing.

Schools could stay open as late as 6pm under new plans to increase ‘school wrap-around childcare’ which are expected to be announced ‘shortly’, Childcare and Education Minister Liz Truss told a group of mothers yesterday.

The proposals will set out plans for longer school days, which could see local childcare providers called in to look after pupils from 3pm or parents asked to run local school clubs, the minister said.

Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, recently called for longer school days and a cut in the length of holidays to make  life easier for working parents.

Ms Truss said: ‘We are hoping to have new proposals out shortly, particularly on schools-based childcare and how we’re going to enable more schools to offer that.’

When challenged by one of the mothers present on how it could work, Ms Truss said: ‘This doesn’t mean teachers working longer hours.

'It can mean private sector nursery providers, voluntary sector providers or parents running an after school club.’

In her speech to about 50 working women, who are part of the networking group Citymothers, the Conservative minister said: ‘We want more schools to be involved in childcare.

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'It’s crazy in this country that we have so many schools open 9am-3pm and then empty afterwards, when they have brilliant facilities. Many parents want to work longer than 9am-3pm.

‘We’re doing work to enable schools to be able to offer more of those services.

'There are some very good examples of schools that already offer 8am-6pm provision, either using teaching staff, teaching assistants, local nursery staff. There are many flexible ways it can be done.'

Share the load: The later hours would see after school clubs run from 3pm-6pm by private sector nursery providers, voluntary sector providers or parents

Ms Truss, tipped for a promotion in a reshuffle next month, called on parents to be ‘more demanding’ of schools to stay open longer and make the burden of childcare easier.

‘In the case of schools they have an opportunity to do more,’ she said.

Parental support: The proposal is set to ease the burden of childcare on working parents

‘As parents we need to be more demanding of our system.’

Under the proposals, the minister also wants school nurseries to be allowed to admit two-year-olds, in order to help parents return to work.

Currently nurseries have to seek permission and are only entitled to take on three to four-year-olds.

During her speech, Ms Truss criticised the ‘complex’ childcare system, where British childcare costs are the second highest in Europe, behind only Switzerland.

‘Our parents pay more than double what parents in France and Germany are paying on childcare,’ she said, adding that government money put into the system doesn’t ‘flow through to the frontline’ as well as it should.

‘At the moment we have a system that isn’t working for parents.’

She also defended controversial changes to the childcare vouchers system, which at present is only available for a fifth of employees.

The new system will make tax breaks available per child, although it will be less generous to higher-rate taxpayers.



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