The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Our experience too, until we got our eldest into a forest school nursery in September. Completely different experience - for example today ~30 2-4 year olds took a train and bus to get to the nearest beach.
It’s run almost entirely by love as far as I can tell and, as the vast majority of kids qualify for the free hours I have no clue how they make the numbers add up. We feel very lucky to have got him in there.
Boosting early years' childcare is a no brainer: - Keeping more parents in the workforce will improve economic activity and reduce the extent to which their careers stall - More affordable childcare will make a difference to whether some people have a baby (or a second) which reduces the inversion of the population pyramid
Likewise to increasing the maximum pension lifetime allowance discouraging early retirement and so retain doctors etc for longer.
Next step: replace the removal of the personal tax allowance with moving the 45p tax rate to £100k. The more easily understood headline will be increasing the number of well paid jobs fall under the 45p rate, while in reality it removes an unreasonably high marginal rate that discourages productive workers earning more.
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others.
Wasn't the Barrow case shamelessly ramped by some of the more excitable Islamophobes on here?
It was. That's why I'm so impressed by him. Just comes across as a lovely bloke.
There's a big lag in understanding about Scottish politics. Articles by people like Fintan O'Toole and such expressing this mantra that Britain may be on the brink of breaking-up.
It's nonsense. For now the Union is secure. They've won. It's as simple as that. 1/....
The SNP is a completely broken instrument. Forget not only the party machine and its personalities - Scottish nationalism itself has been proved incapable of its mission. 4/
It's incapable on the most elementary level. Doesn't even know how to think about the problems presented by independence. Doesn't know how to begin thinking about those problems. The SNP, under any leader, can no more achieve independence than a horse can fix a car engine. 5/
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
“maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios” are higher in this country than anywhere else in Europe, IIRC.
This gold plating of child care raised the cost to that of private school for those able to use the legit providers.
And just as in the days when only black cabs were legal in London, everyone else uses unregistered amateur help.
Unless they are rich enough to afford space for an au pair.
I would much rather higher quality childcare workers than higher quantity.
Put the pay up then. I'd love to be doing it. It's not economically viable.
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others. Should he lose in the next GE, any other seat would be blessed to have him.
I've spoken with him on tidal lagoons. He's one of the good guys upon which the Conservative Party should have a future. If he holds his seat.
Which would have been so much easier if the Government were commencing a tidal lagoon in his constituency.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Our experience too, until we got our eldest into a forest school nursery in September. Completely different experience - for example today ~30 2-4 year olds took a train and bus to get to the nearest beach.
It’s run almost entirely by love as far as I can tell and, as the vast majority of kids qualify for the free hours I have no clue how they make the numbers add up. We feel very lucky to have got him in there.
Forest school is one of the great unacknowledged inventions of this century Far more important than anyone on a six figure tech salary. They deserve Knighthoods and bouquets.
Boosting early years' childcare is a no brainer: - Keeping more parents in the workforce will improve economic activity and reduce the extent to which their careers stall - More affordable childcare will make a difference to whether some people have a baby (or a second) which reduces the inversion of the population pyramid
Likewise to increasing the maximum pension lifetime allowance discouraging early retirement and so retain doctors etc for longer.
Next step: replace the removal of the personal tax allowance with moving the 45p tax rate to £100k. The more easily understood headline will be increasing the number of well paid jobs fall under the 45p rate, while in reality it removes an unreasonably high marginal rate that discourages productive workers earning more.
Yes, the current situation is utterly ludicrous. If you are getting close to the threshold it makes sense to try to phase a few gigs into the next year so HMRC don’t change your tax code.
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others. Should he lose in the next GE, any other seat would be blessed to have him.
Yes, my thoughts too. I don’t know if I would be able to be so level headed, faced with such a situation.
The hotheads get all the media attention, obscuring the reality that a large chunk of MPs are actually rather decent, fair minded folk.
There's a big lag in understanding about Scottish politics. Articles by people like Fintan O'Toole and such expressing this mantra that Britain may be on the brink of breaking-up.
It's nonsense. For now the Union is secure. They've won. It's as simple as that. 1/....
The SNP is a completely broken instrument. Forget not only the party machine and its personalities - Scottish nationalism itself has been proved incapable of its mission. 4/
It's incapable on the most elementary level. Doesn't even know how to think about the problems presented by independence. Doesn't know how to begin thinking about those problems. The SNP, under any leader, can no more achieve independence than a horse can fix a car engine. 5/
Independence may be flawed but keeping a recalcitrant Scotland in the union is hardly that great either. What's the plan to bring us together? Or do we just assume that this is like one of those marriages where neither party is very happy but it's too expensive to divorce? Can we be bothered to make an effort?
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Hmm mine also has a "good" rating. Junior is in there every morning (Partner works Midnight to 7 am), for instance today I received 11 updates on food, naps, nappy changes, along with one activity one containing pictures of her enjoying herself. The team hasn't changed since we got her in at ~ 6 months old and they track her development over time. I note in the OFSTED report The nursery employs 13 members of childcare staff. Of these, 12 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level 3 and above, including the manager with an early years degree.
We'll keep her in there till she's ready for school I think.
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others. Should he lose in the next GE, any other seat would be blessed to have him.
I've spoken with him on tidal lagoons. He's one of the good guys upon which the Conservative Party should have a future. If he holds his seat.
Which would have been so much easier if the Government were commencing a tidal lagoon in his constituency.
Good. I'm delighted that is your view from the opposite political view. It's like Blair losing the Beaconsfield by-election. If you lot are going into Opposition I would like it to be sensible and effective. That I'd consider voting for him is quite a step for me. But I would. That he's in favour of tidal lagoons (a no brainer for me), only reinforces that.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
“maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios” are higher in this country than anywhere else in Europe, IIRC.
This gold plating of child care raised the cost to that of private school for those able to use the legit providers.
And just as in the days when only black cabs were legal in London, everyone else uses unregistered amateur help.
Unless they are rich enough to afford space for an au pair.
What is the maximum ratio? 3 to 1 for babies? I don't have children but I'm far from convinced about the merits of group daycare for toddlers.
You’re only safe as a woman if you escape to a blue state . The red states are becoming ever more horrific in attacking women’s rights . The GOP are a cancer on the USA .
How have Stuart and Leon managed to be banned simultaneously? Some mutual expiration of Scottish subsamples I assume?
Leon, Dickson and CHB all within 72 hours. No one can accuse the bans of being partisan anyway.
CHB as well? Blimey
He was on number 3 so I guess he’ll be back as CHB4. His Tom baker phase.
Dickson clearly got out of bed the wrong side and was bang out of order from the off today. Rightly banned. Probably didn’t sleep well thinking SNP face years of melting down that seemed impossible to think just six months ago. Is this a fair post?
As a Yoon I don't have a say about who'll become first minister, but having seen and heard the candidates it will disappointment me if it's not Forbes. Otoh either of the others will be good for Yoonism.
It is a dilemma but Scotland needs some competent management by someone whose idea of a decision is not to aim for the long grass or pick unnecessary fights. Yousaf as FM is a truly depressing prospect.
I am pretty relaxed about strong religious views, but I can see Forbes is too far out for modern politics.
I am not that bothered by her religious views. She has been very clear to anyone willing to listen that is how she chooses to live her life but she doesn't expect others to do the same. I admire the fact she can put a moderately complex sentence together and maintain a line of thought for more than a minute or two. These are not high bars but Ash is borderline demented and Yousaf is both stupid and incompetent. Scotland needs better.
Neither am I. But this, actually, is far less significant than that her position appears to be a complete repudiation of the Sturgeon progressive project. That's why the entire SNP establishment is behind Yousaf despite him being an obvious dud. My pet theory is that they wish to keep the option of Nicola returning open. The election of 32-yr old Forbes could well close that down.
Yes. In overall terms, she’s centrist, like Blair was.
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others. Should he lose in the next GE, any other seat would be blessed to have him.
I've spoken with him on tidal lagoons. He's one of the good guys upon which the Conservative Party should have a future. If he holds his seat.
Which would have been so much easier if the Government were commencing a tidal lagoon in his constituency.
Good. I'm delighted that is your view from the opposite political view. It's like Blair losing the Beaconsfield by-election. If you lot are going into Opposition I would like it to be sensible and effective. That I'd consider voting for him is quite a step for me. But I would. That he's in favour of tidal lagoons (a no brainer for me), only reinforces that.
Most future election winning PMs first get elected in opposition. Blair in 1983 (having stood in Beaconsfield in 1982), May in 1997, Cameron and Boris in 2001, Starmer (most likely) 2015.
If you want to be a long serving PM as opposed to just leader of the Opposition or stop gap PM ironically the worst time to be first elected is when your party is in power, see IDS 1992, Hague 1989, Howard 1983, Ed Miliband 2005, Sunak (most likely) 2015
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
“maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios” are higher in this country than anywhere else in Europe, IIRC.
This gold plating of child care raised the cost to that of private school for those able to use the legit providers.
And just as in the days when only black cabs were legal in London, everyone else uses unregistered amateur help.
Unless they are rich enough to afford space for an au pair.
What is the maximum ratio? 3 to 1 for babies? I don't have children but I'm far from convinced about the merits of group daycare for toddlers.
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
You are right, but remember that a lot of social care and community activity is done free of charge by retired people. Without their volunteering even more things would be in dire straits.
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
The worst, imo, was their outright assault on policing & the criminal justice system.
That Corbyn managed to move the opinion polls in his favour - in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing - illustrated the sheer ideological lunacy of the Cameron/Osborne project. They had no answer.
The tories, losing on crime. To Jeremy Corbyn!
You don’t need to have read Hayek or Hobbes to understand that governments fuck with people’s security at their peril.
They fully deserved the punch in the face they got in 2017 and have been reverse ferreting ever since.
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Hmm mine also has a "good" rating. Junior is in there every morning (Partner works Midnight to 7 am), for instance today I received 11 updates on food, naps, nappy changes, along with one activity one containing pictures of her enjoying herself. The team hasn't changed since we got her in at ~ 6 months old and they track her development over time. I note in the OFSTED report The nursery employs 13 members of childcare staff. Of these, 12 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level 3 and above, including the manager with an early years degree.
We'll keep her in there till she's ready for school I think.
Heck, do you think they could find a place for me? Bonus for them: can still change me own diapers.
On my way back from another new ground. Been to Wealdstone to see a famous 4-0 win foe my home town team. LNER done a fine job and only £30 return from Newark - bargain. Should be home by 1.15 so another game later.
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
The worst, imo, was their outright assault on policing & the criminal justice system.
That Corbyn managed to move the opinion polls in his favour - in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing - illustrated the sheer ideological lunacy of the Cameron/Osborne project.
The tories, losing on crime. To Jeremy Corbyn!
You don’t need to have read Hayek or Hobbes to understand that governments fuck with people’s security at their peril.
They fully deserved the punch in the face they got in 2017 and have been reverse ferreting ever since.
The whole defund the police saga in the USA reminded me of Theresa May....
As you say the entire farago was a specatcular own goal with what ought to have been a very natural Tory constituency.
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
The frown had actually leapt out at me as looking like the beginning of a bottom shape 🍑
All gone now though so no bum note for Labour.
I presume wiki uses a least squares fitting type method. Not a fan with of that with the data in question, given the obvious variety in the different pollsters. I wonder whether a plot of the gap )or various different gaps between various parties and aggregations of parties) in every published poll is a better way to look at it?
I don’t necessarily have a better idea, but just thinking out loud.
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
Extremely impressed with Simon Fell MP on World Tonight on the phantom Barrow grooming case. Balanced, empathetic, nuanced and utterly focused on his constituents' needs, rather than political advantage and grandstanding. He's a Tory MP I could consider voting for. Not all Red Wall MP's are like the others. Should he lose in the next GE, any other seat would be blessed to have him.
I've spoken with him on tidal lagoons. He's one of the good guys upon which the Conservative Party should have a future. If he holds his seat.
Which would have been so much easier if the Government were commencing a tidal lagoon in his constituency.
Good. I'm delighted that is your view from the opposite political view. It's like Blair losing the Beaconsfield by-election. If you lot are going into Opposition I would like it to be sensible and effective. That I'd consider voting for him is quite a step for me. But I would. That he's in favour of tidal lagoons (a no brainer for me), only reinforces that.
"The Tory From the Blue Lagoon" - Starring Ricou Browning and Brooke Shields, with special appearance by Nick Palmer exMP as wildlife protection officer Farley Woke
Off topic. Was kicking Leon a pre-emptive move to avoid endless feedback on Chat GPT-4 which is coming out next week? Apparently it's 571 times more powerful than Chat GPT-3 and will include video and audio. How long until a future generation presents MOTD?
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
The worst, imo, was their outright assault on policing & the criminal justice system.
That Corbyn managed to move the opinion polls in his favour - in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing - illustrated the sheer ideological lunacy of the Cameron/Osborne project.
The tories, losing on crime. To Jeremy Corbyn!
You don’t need to have read Hayek or Hobbes to understand that governments fuck with people’s security at their peril.
They fully deserved the punch in the face they got in 2017 and have been reverse ferreting ever since.
The whole defund the police saga in the USA reminded me of Theresa May....
As you say the entire farago was a specatcular own goal with what ought to have been a very natural Tory constituency.
For a Conservative-led government to treat criminal justice as a luxury, rather than a necessity, was weird to say the least.
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
Gosh. It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
An extraordinary amount of decisions made by the Cameron/Clegg/Osborne government have turned to have been false economies at best; outright state vandalism at worst. That Big Society where everyone did everything for free out of the goodness of their hearts never did materialise, did it? Oh yeah, food banks, I suppose…
The worst, imo, was their outright assault on policing & the criminal justice system.
That Corbyn managed to move the opinion polls in his favour - in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing - illustrated the sheer ideological lunacy of the Cameron/Osborne project.
The tories, losing on crime. To Jeremy Corbyn!
You don’t need to have read Hayek or Hobbes to understand that governments fuck with people’s security at their peril.
They fully deserved the punch in the face they got in 2017 and have been reverse ferreting ever since.
The whole defund the police saga in the USA reminded me of Theresa May....
As you say the entire farago was a specatcular own goal with what ought to have been a very natural Tory constituency.
For a Conservative-led government to treat criminal justice as a luxury, rather than a necessity, was weird to say the least.
All that being said, and I broadly agree with you both, there is something to be said for only the Tories being able to reform the police and only Labour being able to reform the NHS. She did get rid of some silly allowances and reduce the numbers of police sat in back office jobs that could be civilianised. But she went too far.
Biggest thing Tories need to do (probably impossible) is slash energy, fuel and mortgage costs.
Kiboshing inflation is the best tax cut there is.
It is not impossible at all - they choose not to.
We've already seen in this thread a grand plan to offer free childcare - nice, but it isn't free, it's the taxpayer stepping in to 'support' again, like furlough, the energy support scheme, etc. The rumours are that Hunt will spend his spare cash rather than stop taking so much of it, and so far it looks that way. This Governments' socialist choke hold on the economy is beyond Corbyn's wildest dreams.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
“maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios” are higher in this country than anywhere else in Europe, IIRC.
This gold plating of child care raised the cost to that of private school for those able to use the legit providers.
And just as in the days when only black cabs were legal in London, everyone else uses unregistered amateur help.
Unless they are rich enough to afford space for an au pair.
I would much rather higher quality childcare workers than higher quantity.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Hmm mine also has a "good" rating. Junior is in there every morning (Partner works Midnight to 7 am), for instance today I received 11 updates on food, naps, nappy changes, along with one activity one containing pictures of her enjoying herself. The team hasn't changed since we got her in at ~ 6 months old and they track her development over time. I note in the OFSTED report The nursery employs 13 members of childcare staff. Of these, 12 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level 3 and above, including the manager with an early years degree.
We'll keep her in there till she's ready for school I think.
The local “Montessori influenced” nursery we used was excellent - planned days with a lot of working learning social and academic skills into the play in various subtle ways.
I disagree with the header, I think this is the right policy for Sunak to win the next election. The fact that it's not popular in safe Labour seats doesn't matter under FPTP.
Since the policy’s been announced Labour’s turned that frown upside down…
The frown had actually leapt out at me as looking like the beginning of a bottom shape 🍑
All gone now though so no bum note for Labour.
I presume wiki uses a least squares fitting type method. Not a fan with of that with the data in question, given the obvious variety in the different pollsters. I wonder whether a plot of the gap )or various different gaps between various parties and aggregations of parties) in every published poll is a better way to look at it?
I don’t necessarily have a better idea, but just thinking out loud.
No. Perky tits, saggy tits and bums is the best way of doing it.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
“maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios” are higher in this country than anywhere else in Europe, IIRC.
This gold plating of child care raised the cost to that of private school for those able to use the legit providers.
And just as in the days when only black cabs were legal in London, everyone else uses unregistered amateur help.
Unless they are rich enough to afford space for an au pair.
I would much rather higher quality childcare workers than higher quantity.
Stop talking sense on PB
This isn’t IntelligentIdeasBetting.com, you know.
It's Truss-sense - measures to reduce the ratio to those seen in other European nations, scrapped by Sunak/Hunt for no motivation that I can see beyond spreading piss around like a tomcat.
"Britain embraces trivia because it is stuck on the big issues The fuss over Gary Lineker distracts a nation with no good choices on Brexit, growth and other important questions" (via search)
What a nice compliment Trump gave DeSantis, comparing him to Mitt Romney, who earned a JD and an MBA from Harvard, simultaneously, has a spectacularly successful marriage, had a remarkable business career, won election as a Republican governor in a very Democratic state -- and won a higher percentage of the popular vote in 2012 (47.2%) against a stronger candidate, than Trump did in 2016 (46.1%).
(Sadly I can't agree with Trump on that comparison; DeSantis is no Romney.)
What a nice compliment Trump gave DeSantis, comparing him to Mitt Romney, who earned a JD and an MBA from Harvard, simultaneously, has a spectacularly successful marriage, had a remarkable business career, won election as a Republican governor in a very Democratic state -- and won a higher percentage of the popular vote in 2012 (47.2%) against a stronger candidate, than Trump did in 2016 (46.1%).
(Sadly I can't agree with Trump on that comparison; DeSantis is no Romney.)
Note that another eminent albeit disgraced politico, who also harbors hope of a return from Elba) who famously took a free kick at Mitt Romney is . . . wait for it . . . Boris Johnson.
Personally think that Ron DeSantis bears little resemblance to Romney; rather, he's doing an excellent Viktor Orban impersonation.
How have Stuart and Leon managed to be banned simultaneously? Some mutual expiration of Scottish subsamples I assume?
Leon, Dickson and CHB all within 72 hours. No one can accuse the bans of being partisan anyway.
CHB as well? Blimey
He was on number 3 so I guess he’ll be back as CHB4. His Tom baker phase.
Dickson clearly got out of bed the wrong side and was bang out of order from the off today. Rightly banned. Probably didn’t sleep well thinking SNP face years of melting down that seemed impossible to think just six months ago. Is this a fair post?
He doesn’t seem to like this place, the posters here or those who run it so why invest so much time here. Mystifying.
How have Stuart and Leon managed to be banned simultaneously? Some mutual expiration of Scottish subsamples I assume?
Leon, Dickson and CHB all within 72 hours. No one can accuse the bans of being partisan anyway.
CHB as well? Blimey
He was on number 3 so I guess he’ll be back as CHB4. His Tom baker phase.
Dickson clearly got out of bed the wrong side and was bang out of order from the off today. Rightly banned. Probably didn’t sleep well thinking SNP face years of melting down that seemed impossible to think just six months ago. Is this a fair post?
He doesn’t seem to like this place, the posters here or those who run it so why invest so much time here. Mystifying.
Strangely enough though, my theory goes, the SNP will do very well from not being in Scottish Government. Going into opposition, to everything, Independence could refind voice and momentum at a time, this leadership election, all the candidates bizarrely saying independence looks a long way off, are they not, and don’t seem to clearly see a pathway to getting there.
Maybe Dickson shouldn’t be so grumpy about this turn of events. For SNP and independence it might not turn out so bad for very long at all.
"Britain embraces trivia because it is stuck on the big issues The fuss over Gary Lineker distracts a nation with no good choices on Brexit, growth and other important questions" (via search)
A budget day is day of spin from government party. But it’s what the Chancellor won’t mention.
QE under the conservatives went on too long.
UK with £2.5 trillion of debt which we didn’t have 10 years ago, and interest rates all over the world are jumping from 0.1% to 5%. Pay back time is just beginning - we have to start finding £125 billion a year to cover the cost of our debt. That’s £5,000 per household.
Tax, gilts, inflation, borrowing likely to remain high for years to come.
The extent incomes have been eroded during this term of Tory government, so he pulls a rabbit from the hat exactly how he will fix that.
How have Stuart and Leon managed to be banned simultaneously? Some mutual expiration of Scottish subsamples I assume?
Leon, Dickson and CHB all within 72 hours. No one can accuse the bans of being partisan anyway.
CHB as well? Blimey
He was on number 3 so I guess he’ll be back as CHB4. His Tom baker phase.
Dickson clearly got out of bed the wrong side and was bang out of order from the off today. Rightly banned. Probably didn’t sleep well thinking SNP face years of melting down that seemed impossible to think just six months ago. Is this a fair post?
He doesn’t seem to like this place, the posters here or those who run it so why invest so much time here. Mystifying.
The Guardian suggesting free childcare to be extended down to 1 and 2 year olds. Would be a huge, huge policy. I hope they extend to 35h and for outside of term time too. It will remove a huge barrier to getting people back into work. Though we don't qualify we know a lot of our friends where the wife is working part time or taking a career break because childcare is so expensive for them. My sister does a 3 day week at the moment, I think she'd easily push up to 4 days if childcare costs went down.
Additionally it's a good policy to try and get families to have one more child.
How will the Guardian afford this? Are they finally going to put their website behind a paywall?
They are saying that Hunt will announce it in the Budget.
Tax and spend, spend and tax - the Tory way these days.
Nah, this is a policy that will eventually pay for itself due to higher labour force participation and an increase in the fertility rate and all of the extra spending it comes with.
There's a risk that the government try to do it on the cheap. What they promise to pay childcare providers isn't enough to cover their costs, and so you end up with a reduction in childcare supply at the same time as an increase in childcare demand. Then effectively you have the NHS system, where supposedly it is free, but actually it is rationed by restricting supply, and so you have lots of people on waiting lists waiting for a place for their child at the local nursery, just as people are on waiting lists for ages for NHS treatment.
They've already done that.
The Government stands accused of ‘shamelessly’ and ‘knowingly underfunding’ the early years sector, after private Government documents obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveal that ministers at the Department for Education were aware that it was severely underfunding providers of funded childcare places for three- and four-year-olds.
The briefing, shared today after a two-year Freedom of Information dispute with the DfE, shows that early years funding rates for 2020/21 were less than two-thirds of what officials estimated to be the true cost of ‘fully funding’ the scheme.
The documents also reveal ministers knew the inadequate level of investment proposed would result in higher costs for parents of younger children, and that nurseries, pre-schools and childminders would be forced to use maximum statutory adult-to-child ratios – despite the impact this could have on the quality of provision.
One briefing document obtained by the Early Years Alliance reveals that in 2015, civil servants at the DfE estimated the cost of providing a Government-funded early years place for a three- or four-year old would reach £7.49 per child per hour by 2020-21.
It suggests that providers should ‘become more efficient’ in order to reduce costs.
The end result of this was not that hard-pressed nurseries 'became more efficient to reduce costs.' They hiked prices for younger children to plug the gaps left by the scheme, or they folded.
Childcare is like most other things that this Government does. If it's not a priority for wealthy retirees then it gets done on the cheap or it doesn't get done at all.
Looking back our experience of nursery in England was poor. It was just kids sitting bunched together in a room soiling themselves and crying with teenagers looking after them, who would be constantly changing. My son didn't like it but he only went for two mornings a week. It got an Ofsted good rating. I think our opinion in retrospect is that we should either have sent him to the nursery at the independent school or looked after him ourselves, as he got absolutely nothing out of going to this nursery.
Hmm mine also has a "good" rating. Junior is in there every morning (Partner works Midnight to 7 am), for instance today I received 11 updates on food, naps, nappy changes, along with one activity one containing pictures of her enjoying herself. The team hasn't changed since we got her in at ~ 6 months old and they track her development over time. I note in the OFSTED report The nursery employs 13 members of childcare staff. Of these, 12 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level 3 and above, including the manager with an early years degree.
We'll keep her in there till she's ready for school I think.
The local “Montessori influenced” nursery we used was excellent - planned days with a lot of working learning social and academic skills into the play in various subtle ways.
My sister went to a Montessori school (which she called the "multistorey school") and my widowed father ended up going out with the headteacher for many years, whose son became my best friend growing up. Oh, and my sister seemed to learn something there.
What a nice compliment Trump gave DeSantis, comparing him to Mitt Romney, who earned a JD and an MBA from Harvard, simultaneously, has a spectacularly successful marriage, had a remarkable business career, won election as a Republican governor in a very Democratic state -- and won a higher percentage of the popular vote in 2012 (47.2%) against a stronger candidate, than Trump did in 2016 (46.1%).
(Sadly I can't agree with Trump on that comparison; DeSantis is no Romney.)
Note that another eminent albeit disgraced politico, who also harbors hope of a return from Elba) who famously took a free kick at Mitt Romney is . . . wait for it . . . Boris Johnson.
Personally think that Ron DeSantis bears little resemblance to Romney; rather, he's doing an excellent Viktor Orban impersonation.
Boris is firmly trapped on his political St. Helena, with the Commons Privileges Committee his poisoned wallpaper*.....
Feck this free childcare bollocks. If you want kids, look after them yourself until they are old enough to start school.
I’m actually petitioning Bristol City Council to reopen the mine underneath our house. That way our two can start being productive, rather than lazing about the house all day drawing on the walls with crayon.
What a nice compliment Trump gave DeSantis, comparing him to Mitt Romney, who earned a JD and an MBA from Harvard, simultaneously, has a spectacularly successful marriage, had a remarkable business career, won election as a Republican governor in a very Democratic state -- and won a higher percentage of the popular vote in 2012 (47.2%) against a stronger candidate, than Trump did in 2016 (46.1%).
(Sadly I can't agree with Trump on that comparison; DeSantis is no Romney.)
Note that another eminent albeit disgraced politico, who also harbors hope of a return from Elba) who famously took a free kick at Mitt Romney is . . . wait for it . . . Boris Johnson.
Personally think that Ron DeSantis bears little resemblance to Romney; rather, he's doing an excellent Viktor Orban impersonation.
Boris is firmly trapped on his political St. Helena, with the Commons Privileges Committee his poisoned wallpaper*.....
Feck this free childcare bollocks. If you want kids, look after them yourself until they are old enough to start school.
I’m actually petitioning Bristol City Council to reopen the mine underneath our house. That way our two can start being productive, rather than lazing about the house all day drawing on the walls with crayon.
Comments
It’s run almost entirely by love as far as I can tell and, as the vast majority of kids qualify for the free hours I have no clue how they make the numbers add up. We feel very lucky to have got him in there.
- Keeping more parents in the workforce will improve economic activity and reduce the extent to which their careers stall
- More affordable childcare will make a difference to whether some people have a baby (or a second) which reduces the inversion of the population pyramid
Likewise to increasing the maximum pension lifetime allowance discouraging early retirement and so retain doctors etc for longer.
Next step: replace the removal of the personal tax allowance with moving the 45p tax rate to £100k. The more easily understood headline will be increasing the number of well paid jobs fall under the 45p rate, while in reality it removes an unreasonably high marginal rate that discourages productive workers earning more.
That's why I'm so impressed by him.
Just comes across as a lovely bloke.
There's a big lag in understanding about Scottish politics. Articles by people like Fintan O'Toole and such expressing this mantra that Britain may be on the brink of breaking-up.
It's nonsense. For now the Union is secure. They've won. It's as simple as that. 1/....
The SNP is a completely broken instrument. Forget not only the party machine and its personalities - Scottish nationalism itself has been proved incapable of its mission. 4/
It's incapable on the most elementary level. Doesn't even know how to think about the problems presented by independence. Doesn't know how to begin thinking about those problems. The SNP, under any leader, can no more achieve independence than a horse can fix a car engine. 5/
https://twitter.com/David_Jamieson7/status/1635766614149693440?s=20
I'd love to be doing it. It's not economically viable.
It's almost as if closing Sure Start may have been an error.
Which would have been so much easier if the Government were commencing a tidal lagoon in his constituency.
Far more important than anyone on a six figure tech salary.
They deserve Knighthoods and bouquets.
The hotheads get all the media attention, obscuring the reality that a large chunk of MPs are actually rather decent, fair minded folk.
I note in the OFSTED report
The nursery employs 13 members of childcare staff. Of these, 12 hold appropriate early years qualifications at level 3 and above, including the manager with an early years degree.
We'll keep her in there till she's ready for school I think.
I'm delighted that is your view from the opposite political view.
It's like Blair losing the Beaconsfield by-election.
If you lot are going into Opposition I would like it to be sensible and effective.
That I'd consider voting for him is quite a step for me.
But I would.
That he's in favour of tidal lagoons (a no brainer for me), only reinforces that.
'Mr Trump told journalists that he regrets his 2018 endorsement of his now-likely 2024 rival, Mr DeSantis, while deriding him as “Ron Desanctimonious” and comparing him to Mitt Romney during the rally itself.'
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-speech-iowa-rally-desantis-latest-b2300310.html
If you want to be a long serving PM as opposed to just leader of the Opposition or stop gap PM ironically the worst time to be first elected is when your party is in power, see IDS 1992, Hague 1989, Howard 1983, Ed Miliband 2005, Sunak (most likely) 2015
From a non Labour perspective, it’s a shame you are not more involved in writing your own parties policies. 😈
Scary to think of giving Trump ideas!
Actual legal levels tend not to exist in hard and fast terms
https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/research-resources/briefings/recommended-adult-child-ratios-working-with-children
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgI3rhgGOtc
A property price crash might solve the issue. We didn't need double incomes to afford a house in the past.
Almost as much as Boris Johnson. Who can forget his private observance of her mourning for her husband?
All gone now though so no bum note for Labour.
That Corbyn managed to move the opinion polls in his favour - in the aftermath of the Manchester bombing - illustrated the sheer ideological lunacy of the Cameron/Osborne project. They had no answer.
The tories, losing on crime. To Jeremy Corbyn!
You don’t need to have read Hayek or Hobbes to understand that governments fuck with people’s security at their peril.
They fully deserved the punch in the face they got in 2017 and have been reverse ferreting ever since.
As you say the entire farago was a specatcular own goal with what ought to have been a very natural Tory constituency.
I don’t necessarily have a better idea, but just thinking out loud.
We have now reached the point where Nurses working FT need to go to foodbanks as the landlord class soak the ermm poor
Matching Lab on energy but extending free childcare to beyond what the Reevsmes/SKS shitshow says we can afford.
We've already seen in this thread a grand plan to offer free childcare - nice, but it isn't free, it's the taxpayer stepping in to 'support' again, like furlough, the energy support scheme, etc. The rumours are that Hunt will spend his spare cash rather than stop taking so much of it, and so far it looks that way. This Governments' socialist choke hold on the economy is beyond Corbyn's wildest dreams.
This isn’t IntelligentIdeasBetting.com, you know.
Unfortunately you can only have 1 🙂
You are not calling that postal pip inevitable slam dunk from your banker though. It was lucky! Very very lucky. 😝 An Amazing race though.
"Britain embraces trivia because it is stuck on the big issues
The fuss over Gary Lineker distracts a nation with no good choices on Brexit, growth and other important questions" (via search)
https://www.ft.com/content/7f03c61c-28b4-41df-b100-df020a50c011
(Sadly I can't agree with Trump on that comparison; DeSantis is no Romney.)
Personally think that Ron DeSantis bears little resemblance to Romney; rather, he's doing an excellent Viktor Orban impersonation.
Maybe Dickson shouldn’t be so grumpy about this turn of events. For SNP and independence it might not turn out so bad for very long at all.
QE under the conservatives went on too long.
UK with £2.5 trillion of debt which we didn’t have 10 years ago, and interest rates all over the world are jumping from 0.1% to 5%. Pay back time is just beginning - we have to start finding £125 billion a year to cover the cost of our debt. That’s £5,000 per household.
Tax, gilts, inflation, borrowing likely to remain high for years to come.
The extent incomes have been eroded during this term of Tory government, so he pulls a rabbit from the hat exactly how he will fix that.
So I suppose we all got something out of it.
(*As they will tell you at Longwood, it had nothing to do with his death. This makes a reasonable case otherwise: https://mmta.co.uk/2016/10/14/was-napoleon-killed-by-wallpaper/ )
leaked the budget
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2011/sep/30/stone-age-toddlers-art-lessons