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Annette Brooke : I have no great disagreement with the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Goodman). I certainly share his concerns about sustainability. We should, however, also be mindful of the problem of affordability. I am sure that there is a desire for child care, but it may not translate itself into demand for reasons connected with funding. That is an enormous problem for the Government. Large sums are needed to make child care affordable, and I cannot offer an easy solution.
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I want to concentrate on amendments Nos. 5, 13 and 35, all of which deal with the same issue. The Bill does not cover the provision of child care when parents are workless. In Committee, we pointed out that parents might be workless because they were caring, or because they had disabilities themselves. In such circumstances, access to child care might be even more important. I tabled an amendment suggesting that a local authority "may" rather than "must" have regard to providing child care for workless parents. We could be storing up greater costs in the long run by not providing child care, because of the prioritisation of a hard-pressed local authority, when it is deeply needed by both parents and children.
I remember saying that two deaf parents might have hearing children. The children would really need child care, and the ability to socialise more generally. I am still concerned that the Bill does not even use the word "may" to indicate that in some circumstances local authorities throughout the country—not just the best-funded authorities—may need to provide child care.
It could be said that amendment No. 10 is slightly in disguise. Let me explain. I spent a good deal of time in Committee, and indeed on Second Reading, speaking about quality, because I think that it is crucial. However, humbled and crushed into the ground by all the Ministers' answers, I tabled this minimalist amendment. I listened carefully to Ministers who kept telling me that I need not worry about local authorities' monitoring quality, because there were Ofsted inspections. I therefore suggested the additional instruction that local authorities
"must consider the quality of local child care provision with reference to the Ofsted inspection process".
I merely suggest that local authorities should look at Ofsted reports across the board. I hope the Minister will accept that modest, basic requirement in the spirit in which it is proposed by me and by my hon. Friend the Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Mr. Williams). We recognised that we must define what we meant by "quality"; defining a baseline in Ofsted terms could do the job.
In February the Government issued "A Code of Practice on the Provision of Free Nursery Education Places for Three-and Four-Year-Olds". Its emphasis on quality is welcome. It states:
"Local authorities may also require other providers of nursery education to participate in a quality assurance scheme".
In Committee, I pressed the Minister for answers on the Investors in Children kitemark scheme. Although the answers that I received were reassuring, at a meeting of the all-party parliamentary group for children it was clear that early-years providers were again concerned about the future of Investors in Children. It would be helpful if the Minister could update us on the progress of consultation, and tell us whether there is a commitment to maintaining a generally recognised kitemark, or something similar, for quality assurance.
I stress that such monitoring by Ofsted would be minimalist. The problem would be that monitoring might happen only once every three years. However, Ofsted reports can bring strands together. For example, one report observed that there was a high proportion of child care settings in which not all staff were in place at the time of their opening. There is a need for local authorities to keep an eye on such nurseries.
Amendment No. 31, which we tabled, picks up on the idea that we must have a level playing field. The hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Goodman) said that there is a worry that it does not exist. The amendment is fairly modest. I favour neither state nor private provision. I have no agenda on that because I come from an authority that relies on the private and voluntary sector for the bulk of its provision, which is good. However, there are reports from all over the country that some of our important private providers are not satisfied that there is a level playing field, so it is critical that that problem is taken on board.
I tabled amendment No. 59 so that we could return to a matter on which we touched in Committee: consultation with all partners and participants, including young children. I have tabled the amendment to a different clause than I did in Committee because the Minister explained to me that it would not be appropriate for young children to participate in making overall strategy. Amendment No. 59 is a probing amendment that tries to encapsulate the importance of listening to all children. Would it not be groundbreaking to include in the Bill a reference to listening to young children? The Government have funded exciting work on listening to young children, so why not have some recognition of that in the Bill? I think that the amendment could be incorporated in clause 11, but I wait to hear otherwise.
Justine Greening : I support the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Mr. Goodman). As hon. Members have already said, the market is mixed. That is one of the values of the market because it ensures that the provision of child care is diverse. An especially diverse group of people lives in my constituency, so the more diverse our provision, the better the choice for my local parents. It is incumbent on the Government to ensure that the Bill facilitates and helps to develop that mixed market, rather than stifles it. It is thus especially important that we have a level playing field for both private child care providers—there are many excellent ones in my constituency—and provision provided by a local authority.
We have heard that for every five child care places that come into being, three are lost, which suggests that there is a huge amount of churn in the market. The Bill
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places a duty on authorities to assess the local provision of child care, but the churn will make that difficult. It is in everyone's interests to ensure that decisions taken by not only local authorities, but private child care providers, are informed, fair and sustainable so that local authorities do not constantly have to try to assess a situation that is evolving so rapidly that they cannot tell whether the local need for child care provision is being acceptably met.
When we discuss the mixed market, we often forget about the individuals whom we need the market to serve: children. Nurseries may shut down in response to a changing market. However, if the closure is unsustainable, children often find changing their nursery difficult to take. Parents can find it stressful if they suddenly have to find a new child care provider because their existing one was forced out of the market. The more that we can avoid that situation happening unnecessarily, the better.
I especially support amendments Nos. 5 and 35, which would ensure that local authorities would assess parents with disabilities themselves. As my constituency is a London seat, we have perhaps more than our fair share of Victorian buildings, which are not the most accessible in the world. We also have problems with public transport because although the buses are accessible, our local underground is not. It is important that the Bill urges local authorities to consider the accessibility needs and disabilities of parents when determining child care provision so that some people are not disfranchised from a measure that is meant to help absolutely everyone.
Beverley Hughes: I welcome the hon. Member for Wycombe (Mr. Goodman) on his debut to the Front Bench. As he implied, I am well aware of his responsibilities because of the dozens of parliamentary questions that he has assiduously put my way, the answers to which he used to good effect today. It is good to see him on the Front Bench. We are considering a large group of new clauses and amendments, which cover a range of slightly different issues relating to the general matter of sufficiency, so I will try to deal with them in a way that makes coherent sense.
The hon. Gentleman talked about the role of local authorities at the start of his speech. We have stressed the importance of that role throughout the Bill's passage. A local authority is the strategic holder of the ring when making sure that there is a sufficiency of child care places for parents in their area. I appreciate that he wants to utilise all the levers that are already in the system to ensure that there is good local authority practice, sustainability and the level playing field about which he spoke. Several of the amendments represent proposals on best value and local area agreements. Although I appreciate the intention behind them, there is perhaps a misunderstanding about the way in which best value and local area agreements work at present.
There is no need for a separate statutory code such as that in new clause 6 because all the functions carried out by a local authority are automatically covered by the best value regime and the guidance that has already been produced. The new clause would lead to a piecemeal change whereby a different duty of best value operated solely in relation to child care provision. Such a change would be not only confusing for local authorities, but unnecessary.
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I can make a similar point about new clause 8 because fairness is an intrinsic part of the best value regime that has already been legislated for. Local authorities must have regard to the combination of economy, effectiveness and efficiency. In doing so, they must also have regard to a range of considerations that include fairness and transparency. New clauses 8 and 6 together imply that special arrangements would be needed for the child care duty, and that is not the case.
Amendment No. 60 relates to future sustainability. Again, I understand what hon. Members desire, and I support that, but the Bill already imposes a duty on local authorities to secure a sufficiency of child care. The word "secure" implies a duty for continuing effect. As long as the duty remains in place and is phrased in that way, the requirement is for the local authority to ensure sustainability in the future. Local authorities have to consider and plan for future changes that may have an implication on the requirements.
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