Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to page 23 of the Social Mobility Commission's report, Time for Change: an assessment of government policies on social mobility 1997-2017, published on 28 June 2017, what assessment she has made of the reasons for the relatively low demand for subsidised childcare among the most disadvantaged families.

Currently, 71% of disadvantaged two year olds are accessing government funded early education. This has increased by 13 percentage points from 2015.

The Department’s Childcare and Early Years survey provides provide salient, up-to-date information on parents’ use of childcare and early years provision. It provides a range of reasons why families in some local authorities may choose not to access formal childcare. These include the age of the child – 58% of parents of 0-2 year olds felt their child was too young for early education.

The Childcare and Early Years Survey of Parents can be found at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/childcare-and-early-years-survey-of-parents-2014-to-2015.

The Government is committed to supporting disadvantaged children through the 2-year-old entitlement and the Early Years Pupil Premium.