West Yorkshire parents concerned nursery fees could rise due to hike in National Insurance
There's concern parents in West Yorkshire will be faced with higher nursery fees due the national insurance hike
Parents in West Yorkshire are being warned about a potential rise in nursery fees.
Childcare providers say they'll have no choice because of the increase to employer's national insurance contributions announced in the Budget.
A poll by the Early Years Alliance found of 1,007 senior staff in nurseries, preschools and childminders in England - 95% said their setting was likely to raise fees for non-government funded hours if cost pressures from NI and minimum wage rises were not adequately funded or addressed by the Government.
Nearly nine in 10 (87%) said they were likely to introduce or increase charges for optional extras - such as meals, consumables and trips, and around three in five (61%) said they were likely to introduce or increase restrictions on when early entitlement funding can be claimed.
Two in five (40%) said permanent closure of the early years setting was likely, the poll found.
Victoria has a three-year-old who attends nursery in Bingley, West Yorkshire she's not happy about a potential increase in fees: "We've limped along waiting for 30 hours free childcare, paying about £600/£700 a month for a part time place at nursery.
"We finally got our free 30 hours and still managed to pay around £300 a month because it doesn't cover everything that it should do."
Neil Leitch, chief executive of the EYA, said: "We are in the middle of the biggest expansion in the history of the early years sector, one that the government says is key to supporting parents to work and in turn, boosting the economy.
"It makes absolutely no sense, therefore, for the Treasury to turn a blind eye to the potential impact of these changes on our sector when it knows full well that a failure to act will, at best, push up prices even further for parents and, at worst, push the sector to the brink of collapse."
Among the third of survey respondents who calculated the impact of the NI hike on their provider, the poll suggested that the changes will result in additional costs of over £18,600 per setting per year on average.
What do the Government say?
Last week, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson told MPs in the House of Commons that the Government would announce whether early years funding rates for age groups would change to reflect the national insurance hike.
She said: "We will be setting out more detail on funding rates in due course."
Ms Phillipson added that the Government will provide £8.1 billion for the early years entitlements in 2025/26.