Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to improve (a) recruitment, (b) retention, (c) career progression and (d) workload in the early years workforce.

The early years workforce is at the heart of our mission to give every child the best start in life and deliver the Plan for Change. This is why the department is supporting the sector to attract talented staff and childminders by creating conditions for improved recruitment, alongside programmes to better utilise the skills of the existing workforce and make early years careers as accessible as possible.

The department is attracting new people into the early years sector through initiatives like our national recruitment campaign and financial incentives programmes. We are also ensuring there is a career path for everyone who wants to become an early years teacher, through increasing places on our existing teacher training programmes and introducing a new early years teacher degree apprenticeship route.

The department is confident that through our Best Start in Life Strategy, we can lay the foundations for long-term change. We will give early years educators the status they deserve, creating more opportunities to enter the profession, gain higher qualifications, and build fulfilling careers.