Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Gillian Keegan and James Grundy

Monday 23rd October 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Grundy (Leigh) (Con)]

18. What steps her Department is taking to increase access to childcare for working parents.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

This Conservative Government are investing more in childcare than at any other point in our country’s history, ensuring that parents do not have to choose between having a family or having a career. With 30 hours of free childcare on offer from the end of parental leave to the start of school, the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (David Johnston)—I welcome him to his place—is working hard to expand the capacity through new capital investment, more avenues into the workforce and increasing childcare rates.

[James Grundy]

At a Westminster Hall debate on childcare earlier this year, before the Secretary of State’s proposed changes were announced, I expressed concern that low-income families were facing high childcare costs that might make it sub-economic to return to work. Will she tell me how the changes that she has been making will help prevent that?

[Gillian Keegan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. Just to remind everybody, under Labour, parents got just 12.5 hours for three and four-year-olds—less than an hour of free childcare per year in office. We will be spending more than £8 billion a year by 2027-28 to fund 30 hours of free childcare for working parents of children aged nine months to the start of primary school and giving every parent access to wraparound childcare between 8 am and 6 pm, Meanwhile, Labour still does not have a policy for parents.