CEY0016

Written evidence submitted by Pomfret Woodland Community Nursery

Pomfret Woodland Community Nursery, is a not for profit organisation based in South Pontefract an area of deprivation with the Wakefield district of West Yorkshire. The nursery was formerly a council run nursery, part of the neighbourhood nursery initiative, and transferred to its current format in 2013. This was as a result of a group of parents and staff forming a CiC company to take over the running of the nursery.

We are submitting evidence to provide real experiences from within the sector that will support any development for parents going forward.

As a not for profit organisation we have been able to keep our nursery fees lower than most of the other provision in the area. However, the rising costs of staffing and the cost of living has resulted in our nursery fees increasing this year and potentially next year too. Many families are not aware of the tax free childcare scheme and we do promote this to parents when they sign up for a nursery place. We believe this is a barrier for parents returning to full time work, and the complex system of working out what help towards  childcare they are entitled too. It is not clear if they are able to use tax free childcare alongside other benefits they receive, this is especially relevant within the area we are based.

The current recruitment issues that many providers including ourselves face, are resulting in less places been offered to parents. We have had to reduce the number of spaces we can offer over the last 12 months. We have also had a lengthy waiting list for baby places and had to turn many families away, as we can not recruit the staff to offer any further places even though we have the floor space and capacity to do so.

With regards to the tax free childcare, this works well for the parents who access this scheme, with regards to other benefits, we feel if these are to specifically cover childcare costs they would be better paid straight to the provider. This would support parents who get into debt with nurseries and then end up losing places because of unpaid bills.

The biggest challenge facing early years providers is recruitment and retention of the workforce, it appears that this is linked to the pandemic, as the issues have arisen since 2020. As a setting we stayed open throughout and only used the furlough scheme for a short period, we didn’t lay any staff off. We have lost staff to other sectors within education and also staff who have left the sector completely. In relation to recruitment this has been an uphill task, candidates do not turn up for interview or their qualifications are not classed as full and relevant to count in ratios. As a setting we have appointed 2 apprentices and are training 2 of our existing unqualified staff up to level 3, however we are unable to employ any further unqualified staff or trainees as we would not be able to maintain the correct numbers of qualified staff in nursery.

We are attached to an existing children’s centre that is now a family hub, we have seen over the years the services they offer dwindle with the cuts in services. However this is starting to improve with a recent restructure and families are receiving more support from the centre, which is crucial in the area where we are based.

The services that are available to nursery to support SEND children are in place but the demand is outstripping supply. More children are attending nursery with additional needs and to handle their workload it appears that the professionals we work with have amended their criteria for referral. We are seeing more children needing support with social communication.

December 2022