Thousands of parents and childcare workers have signed a petition against plans to reduce staff in early years settings. We reported last week how the Prime Minister is considering relaxing childcare ratios in a bid to cut costs for parents.
The relaxing of health and safety rules would allow nurseries in England to take in more toddlers without employing extra staff. Joanne and Dan Thompson, from Cheadle Hulme, Stockport, are among those fighting the move.
Their baby daughter Millie was just nine months old when she died after choking on food at nursery in 2012. And now a petition set up by the grieving mother of another child, Oliver Steeper, has been signed by more than 45,000 people.
Oliver, also nine months old, is believed to have choked at his nursery in Ashford, Kent, in September.
The petition, launched by his mum Zoe, states: "The Government should not reduce the existing adult-child childcare ratios as has been suggested. There are surely better ways to reduce the cost of living – potentially endangering children in trusted care is not how it should be done.
"Increasing how many children an adult can legally be held responsible for risks increasing the danger that those young children, the most vulnerable in society, are being subjected to."
Current legal requirements say there must be at least one member of staff for every three children aged two and under. For two-year-olds and over, there must be one member of staff for every four children.
It's not the first time the government has considered relaxing ratios as a cost-cutting measure. The Liberal Democrat and Conservative coalition government attempted to relax child-to-staff ratios in England as part of a package of reforms in 2013.
But the plans, led by then-education minister Liz Truss, were abandoned after being opposed by Nick Clegg, who was deputy prime minister at the time.
Last week, Joanne, who has gone on to have two other children with husband Dan - sons Leo, seven, and four-year-old Asher - said she was 'fuming' with the government's proposal.
In a Facebook post, which has now been shared more than 4.5k times, she said: "Dear Mr Boris Johnson, No, Just no. We are absolutely disgusted in your comments today regarding wanting to ease health and safety rules in childcare to help ease financial costs - this is not the answer.
"Your government supported Millie’s Mark and helped to form it - a mechanism to help keep children safer in nurseries and now you flippantly make comments like this. The childcare sector needs support, it needs help. Reducing health and safety measures in childcare is not the answer."
The government says ministers are looking 'at all options' to support parents with the availability, choice and cost of childcare and that health and safety, as well as quality of provision, will 'continue to be of paramount importance'. Any significant changes to regulations would require consultation.
A government spokesperson said: “The Education Secretary has been clear that supporting families with access to childcare and early education is a priority for him. We are working with colleagues all over government to look for ways to improve the cost, choice and availability of childcare places.
“We have invested more than £3.5 billion in each of the last three years to deliver our free childcare offers, including the 30 hours per week for working parents which is supporting thousands of families.”
If Zoe's petition reaches 100k signatures, it will be considered for debate in Parliament.
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