Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what support nursery and childcare providers can receive as a result of the packages of economic support he has announced over the last two weeks.

The government has set out specific measures to support childcare providers during the COVID-19 outbreak:

• Funding for the government’s early years entitlements will continue during any periods of nursery, preschool or childminder closures or when children cannot attend
• To support private nurseries at this time, the Chancellor of the Exchequer has also announced that they will be eligible for a business rates holiday for one year from 1 April

Childcare providers will also benefit from the wider measures the Chancellor of the Exchequer has announced to support the people and businesses of the UK:

• A three-point plan announced in the Budget providing £12 billion of support for public services, individuals and businesses whose finances are affected by the outbreak
• A package to provide additional support for businesses and individuals totalling £350 billion
• The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to help firms continue to keep people in employment. This means that businesses can put workers on temporary leave and the government will pay them cash grants of 80% of their wages up to a cap of £2,500, providing they keep the worker employed
• A scheme to help the UK’s self-employed who are affected by the coronavirus outbreak. The new Self-Employed Income Support Scheme will enable those eligible to receive a cash grant worth 80% of their average monthly trading profit over the last three years. This covers 95% of people who receive the majority of their income from self-employment
• On 28 March, my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, Alok Sharma, announced that the government will also temporarily suspend the wrongful trading provisions to give company directors greater confidence to use their best endeavours to continue trading during this pandemic emergency, without the threat of personal liability should the company ultimately fall into insolvency

The government is also providing the following additional support:

• deferral of Self-Assessment income tax payments due in July 2020 and VAT payments due between 20 March 2020 and 30 June 2020
• grants for businesses that pay little or no business rates
• increased amounts of Universal Credit
• the Coronavirus Bussiness Interruption Loan Scheme

The latest guidance from the department for early years and childcare providers can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-early-years-and-childcare-closures/coronavirus-covid-19-early-years-and-childcare-closures.