The Scottish Government has prioritised funding to enable childcare workers in the private and third sectors who are delivering funded early learning and childcare to be paid at least the real living wage from April 2025.
“We are the only part of the United Kingdom to do so. That was backed by £16 million of investment in 2024-25,” the Minister for Children, Young People and The Promise, Natalie Don-Innes, told MSPs at Holyrood on Thursday.
She added: “In parallel, we continue to work with the sector and local government to progress the longer-term reforms to the sustainable rate-setting process that were recommended by last year’s joint rates review by the Scottish Government and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities.
“We have also legislated to continue the nursery rates relief scheme, which is estimated to be worth about £11 million a year to childcare businesses.”
Ms Don-Innes, pictured left, was answering a question from the Labour MSP Martin Whitfield.
He said the data that was published alongside the early learning and childcare expansion interim evaluation report highlighted that, between 2018 and 2022, there was a 19 per cent decrease in the number of childcare providers in Scotland.
He added: “In England, that reduction was just 10 per cent. That indicates a lack of adequate support for the sector and the providers.”
Mr Whitfield claimed that Ms Don-Innes had previously stated that the Government had been assured that the childcare sector is economically sustainable.
And he asked her to confirm that that this is still the case? Will the Government publish the evidence that supports that view, he queried.
Ms Don-Innes told him: “I am very confident in the economic model. We continue to monitor the sector’s financial sustainability through our financial sustainability health checks. I want to be clear that ensuring such sustainability is a priority for me.
“I have been clear that private, voluntary and independent providers are an integral part of our childcare sector in Scotland.”
She added: “As for further work, that fits in quite well with the rates review, which as well as being about updating sustainable rates guidance is about working with local government and funded providers to consider options for obtaining more robust and reliable cost data to direct future approaches.”
SNP member Jackie Dunbar then asked: “What level of national uptake has there been of the Scottish National Party’s initiative of giving three to five-year-olds up to 1,140 hours of funded early learning and childcare a year, following the support that has been given to childcare providers?”