The Tories need to acknowledge their mistakes on childcare – instead of concentrating on dogmatic deregulation

13 months after David Cameron woke up to the childcare crisis his Government’s choices have created, and copied Labour’s idea of establishing a Childcare Commission, we’re finally expecting to see the results of that piece of work this week.

The Government has some serious work to do to try and make up for three years of inaction. David Cameron promised he would preside over the most family-friendly Government in Europe, yet under him we have gone backwards on childcare. Ministers have prioritised tax breaks for millionaires while childcare costs have continued to rise, places have been lost and financial support for parents has been cut.

While ratios in early years have dominated debate over the last year, today’s report from the Family and Childcare Trust, showing that holiday childcare costs are now up by more than 12% since 2010 with gaps in provision growing rapidly, is a timely reminder that the struggle to juggle work and family life doesn’t end when children begin school.

Typical core school hours are 9-3, while a typical working day is 9-5, with journey times to factor into the equation as well. And of course, a typical school year is 39 weeks, while most working parents will be lucky to get 5 weeks off in total.

The last Labour government recognised these challenges, and invested significant resources and policy thinking into tackling it.

Our Extended Schools programme saw £2.2bn in dedicated funding directed to schools to support the set-up of wrap-around, 8am-6pm services – including affordable and convenient childcare, but also family support and other services for the wider community.

By September 2010, 99% of schools in England were delivering this ‘core offer’. Evaluation found that extended schools were both popular with parents and delivered significant benefits for children, especially for the most disadvantaged.

What did Michael Gove do when he inherited this success story? He scrapped the funding and removed the guarantee for parents, leading to the closure of breakfast and after school clubs up and down the country. Last week’s School Sums report from Aviva showed that wrap-around provision is now the costliest part of a child’s school life, with the average family spending more than £550 a year per child.

The same goes for holiday childcare. Labour’s investment saw the number of places on holiday schemes triple between 2003 and 2010, but in their first year this Government presided over the loss of 10,000 places, and the cash that councils get to plug gaps with their own schemes has been slashed by 40%.

Imagine my surprise, therefore, to see Liz Truss floating the idea last month that schools should stay open until 6pm and provide holiday childcare. Either the Minister thinks that parents have very short memories, or she really should have done a bit more background reading.

To make matters worse for parents of older children, the government’s replacement for the Childcare Voucher scheme – so-called ‘Tax Free Childcare’ – will only initially benefit parents of children up to 5, instead of 15 like now.

This will leave a significant proportion of parents – particularly those who save up vouchers to cover holiday childcare – considerably worse off.

If the Government’s report doesn’t acknowledge the many failings of the last three years, and concentrates instead on the kind of dogmatic deregulation which has got everyone involved in childcare so worried about the safety of children and the quality of early learning they receive, then Ministers will have badly let down mums and dads across the country.