Childcare and Early Years Provision: Parents' Survey, 2010

The introduction of the National Childcare Strategy in 1998 marked a radical shift in government policy and for the first time put childcare provision firmly on the political map. Since then a wide range of childcare initiatives and funding streams have been introduced, and hence there is a need for regular data to aid the evaluation of recent policy interventions in these areas. The <i>Childcare and Early Years Provision</i> survey series is divided into two survey strands: the Parents’ Survey and the Providers’ Survey. <br>
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The Parents’ Survey provides data on parents’ take-up, views and experiences of childcare. Families in England are randomly selected from the Child Benefit Records and all parents had children aged 0-14 years. They are asked about their use and experiences of childcare for all children in the family and to give more detailed information about childcare for a particular child (selected at random where there is more than one child in the family). The current Parents' Survey series replaces two previous surveys: the <i>Survey of Parents of Three and Four-Year-Old Children and Their Use of Early Years Services</i> (conducted between 1997 and 2002) and <i>Parents' Demand for Childcare, </i>conducted in 1999 and 2001 (see SNs 4380 and 4970 respectively).<br>
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The Providers' Survey monitors the characteristics and development of childcare and early years providers and the workforce in England. Information was collected on the number and characteristics of providers, the characteristics of the children enrolled, workforce composition, qualifications and training, recruitment and retention, and business operation. The 2016 survey underwent an extensive redesign, which means findings are not comparable with previous surveys.<br><br>The 2020 survey was
cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic<br>
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Further information is available on the GOV.UK <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-childcare-and-early-years" title="Childcare and Early Years Statistics" target="_blank">Childcare and Early Years Statistics</a> webpage.<br><br><div><span style="font-style: italic;">Special licence data</span></div><div>Additional, more detailed variables from the Providers' Survey in 2018, 2019 and 2021 are available under Special Licence (SL). The SL data have more restrictive access conditions than those made available under the standard End User Licence (EUL) agreement. Prospective users of the SL version will need to complete an extra application form and demonstrate to the data owners exactly why they need access to the additional variables in order to get permission to use that version. Users are advised to consult the EUL version first and the list of variables available under each study before applying.</div><div><br></div>
The <i>Childcare and Early Years Provision: Parents' Survey, 2010 </i> had two key objectives. The first was to provide salient, up-to-date information on parents' use of childcare and early years provision, and their views and experiences of particular childcare providers and childcare provision in general. The second objective was to continue the time series - which has now been running for over ten years - on issues covered throughout the survey series. With respect to both of these aims, the study aimed to provide information to help monitor the progress of policies in the area of childcare and early years education.<br>
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Since the Coalition Government was formed in 2010 there have been a number of other policy initiatives, which are described in the policy document 'Supporting Families in the Foundation Years' (DfE, 2011). Addressing the recommendations of three independent policy reviews for Government, the document outlines plans to reform the Early Years Foundation Stage; retain a national network of Sure Start Children's Centres and consult on a new core purpose; extend free early education to 40% of two-year-olds; revise statutory guidance to increase the flexibility of free early education for three- and four-year-olds; and promote quality and diversity across the early education and childcare sector. Using material from the survey, the report describes in detail what childcare is used by different types of families, changes in take-up over the years, parents' reasons for using or not using childcare and for choosing particular providers, and parents' views on the providers they used and on childcare provision in their local area in general. <br>
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