Childcare Bill

moved Amendment No. 14:"Page 4, line 8, after ““sufficient”” insert ““and is likely to remain sufficient””" The noble Baroness said: In moving Amendment No. 14, I shall speak also to Amendment No. 41. Before I do so, I thank the Minister for all the information sent this week. I shall repay the compliment throughout today’s proceedings by asking lots of questions. Clause 6 places an obligation on local authorities to secure sufficient childcare places to meet the requirements in the Bill. Clause 11 places a duty on local authorities to assess this sufficiency at least every three years and to keep assessments under review. Amendments Nos. 14 and 41 are all about ensuring sustainability and, therefore, stability. Conducting an audit of what provision is already available is, although time-consuming, a relatively easy part of the process, but issues such as changes in how people work and the mobility and flexibility of the workforce are complex. Not least, there are rapidly changing demographics: since the 1970s, the population of under-fives has been on a downward trend, although it is expected to rise slightly by 2020. We are almost asking local authorities to become crystal-ball gazers, and in an unfamiliar and demanding area. I am sure that the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, will have some pertinent questions for the Minister on how assessing sufficiency will work in practice when she speaks to her Amendment No. 30, so I shall not rehearse them here. Much of the new childcare provision is being set up with a five-year funding plan, although I am sure that we shall have to look much further ahead than that. It is coming in with heavy subsidy at the front end. There are genuine concerns that these places may not be sustainable and that a level playing field is not operating. The National Day Nurseries Association recognises the need to widen accessibility to childcare and make it affordable to more families, but it stresses that, to maintain diversity of provision, aspirations for the pricing regime must remain realistic. Local authorities must be mindful that overheads and financial pressures differ between the public, private and voluntary sectors. The noble Baroness, Lady Howarth of Breckland, may have been going to remind the Grand Committee of this anyway but, in last week’s sitting, in response to another amendment, she said that the document Childcare Bill: Duty to Secure Sufficient Childcare states that:"““Local authorities should consider the range of ways that they can work with childcare providers to improve the affordability of childcare””." The noble Baroness warned that, in other areas in which she had been involved, that was sometimes a way of trying to force prices down. I very much hope that that will not happen here. It is especially true in London and the south-east, and if local authorities do not take it into account, there is real danger that they will drive private and voluntary operations out of the market—and then there would be no diversity of provision. As my honourable friend Tim Loughton said in another place, it is,"““no good creating new, heavily subsidised child care places only to knock out perfectly good-quality existing ones””.—[Official Report, Commons, 28/11/05; col. 94.]" Current government figures show that three childcare places are closing for every five opening. There are genuine concerns that this laudable Bill could, if we are not careful, lead to nationalisation of childcare. Existing providers must be given adequate assurance that new childcare will not be created without consulting them and appropriate market research. Parents must be given adequate assurance that they will have real choice for their children, with stability in that choice. These assurances can be achieved with the acceptance of these amendments. I beg to move.