Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what reasons his Department is no longer focusing on using its 2017 Early Years Workforce Strategy to increase the number of specialist graduates employed in early years’ education in favour of focusing on school-based early years’ provision.

We are supporting the expansion of school-based nurseries and also investing in the wider workforce.

The School Nurseries Capital Fund supports the creation of new high quality school-based nursery places for 2 year olds, 3 year olds and 4 year olds to deliver the government’s commitment to build more school-based nurseries and to improve social mobility.

Alongside this, we are committed to ensuring that there are routes to graduate level qualifications for the early years workforce such as, for example, through our funding of the Early Years Initial Teacher Training programme. We are also supporting the professional development of the wider workforce, including through the £20 million Professional Development Fund launched in the national plan, ‘Unlocking Talent, Fulfilling Potential’, published 14 December 2017.