Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many new early years teachers are expected to be recruited in England in the next three years.

The Department supports growth of the graduate workforce by making early years initial teacher training places available to meet demand from childcare employers. As the sector is mainly made up of private businesses, we do not set recruitment targets for early years teachers. We do, however, offer financial support to employers so that they can release their staff to train as an early years teacher.

We are currently developing a workforce strategy to help remove the barriers to attracting, retaining and developing excellent staff in our early years settings, including what government can do to help grow the graduate workforce.