Issue - meetings

[Report of the Assistant Director for Commissioning. To be introduced by the Cabinet Member for Children and Families]The report sets out the implications for Haringey of the implementation of the National Early Years Funding Formula for Haringey from April 2017.

The Cabinet Member for Children and Families introduced the report which set out proposals for a new early years funding formula in Haringey which would ensure that the Council continues to meet its statutory responsibilities in relation to funding the free entitlement for 2, 3 and 4 year olds. The proposals also sought to ensure that the Council were able to implement changes in a fair and transparent way, acknowledging that work would need to continue to manage the impact of the changes on the local childcare market.

The Cabinet Member thanked officers in Commissioning and early years for their hard work in taking forward the consultation on the national funding formula for early years in tight timescales which had been extremely challenging.

RESOLVED

1. To note the outcome of the consultations undertaken with providers of early education and childcare in Haringey, and with the Schools Forum, as set out in the appendices to this report.

2. To agree the introduction of a revised early years funding formula for Haringey from April 2017 which includes:

-          A universal base rate for 3 and 4 year olds in Haringey set at £4.88 per hour, per child

-          Mandatory deprivation supplement funding of £0.30 per hour, per child, derived from the £0.52 per hour per child available for supplements

-          A supplement for quality with an annual budget of £76,000 to facilitate system leadership for providers requiring support

3. To agree that there will be no supplements set for Rurality / Sparsity, Flexibility or English as an Additional Language.

4. To agree to reduce from April 2019 the current local authority funding rate of £6 per hour for providers of the 2 year old free entitlement, to the funding rate (£5.66 per hour) received by the local authority from the DfE.

5. To agree that £0.7m of Dedicated Schools Grant be set aside as transitional funding to subside childcare for the period from April to August 2017 prior to the introduction of new fees and the 30 hours funded entitlement for 3 and 4 year olds.

6. To agree to remove the Council’s involvement in setting the fees for school-based early years provision, allowing the four maintained school-run settings to set their own fees.

7. To agree to replace the current single fee structure, applied across all four Council-run childcare settings with a new structure where fees differ from setting to setting.

8. To agree to the further exploration of a refreshed, financially viable childcare offer to be in place at the Park Lane setting from as early as September 2017.

9. To agree to increase fees for the four Council–run childcare settings from current levels in order to generate the levels of income required to mitigate the loss of subsidy funding. This change to fees would be implemented from September 2017 and kept under review due to the risk of a negative impact on service take-up and therefore, fee income generation.

10. To agree that, where there may be early years funding remaining, once the early years funding formula  ...  view the full minutes text for item 187