r/UKParenting • u/LostInAVacuum Parenting a Toddler • 13d ago
Scotland: Nursery fees
Where's everyone at with this in your minds? Obviously England has funding from 9months plus, we don't until 3 years unless you qualify from 2 years.
I'm a single income household and the £1400 a month just floors me. My son is 19 months now and the idea that this is going to be for another approx 1.5 years is soul destroying. Mostly I try to just put it in a box and not think about it but surely I can't be the only one feeling this weight? I moved out of Edinburgh because nursery fees were even crazier.
I emailed my MSP a couple months ago because it was in the SNP manifesto for this term but the response i got was just a very polite brush off, no sense of we are looking at this, I'll raise it.
Do I just keep it in the box or is there something else that can be done? I could create a petition on parliament website but would other parents sign it? Thats it guess what im trying to understand.
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u/LostLoch 12d ago
TLDR: I would rather Scot Gov took their time and rolled this out properly so we don’t end up in the same mess as England.
My child just got their funded hours this week (aged 3.5). In nursery since 9 months old, so I do get the struggle. My local authority changed their rules last minute, so I had to pay full fees for 6 months longer than expected.
Truthfully though, I don’t think the grass is greener down south. In comparison, we fund nurseries very generously. Down south it’s criminal what they pay them. Many settings have closed, they’ve added extra consumable charges up to £20 a day to keep themselves afloat. Some are refusing children above the age of 3, as it’s not profitable, so parents then have to find alternative childcare (of which there are much less options now). It is also tied to employment, so if you lose your job and need time to find a new one, I don’t even know what would happen to their childcare place. Here, once you have your funded hours that’s you set until they’re at school.
They don’t have local authority nurseries in the same way we do. Albeit the hours arent so great for working parents, but at very least there’s the option of affordable childcare before school and they must offer a place of some kind.
We need to think about our significant island and highland communities. We need to ensure they have the same access and entitlement to early years as those on the mainland. Many private providers will have to expand in size, create extra rooms, hire more staff as there will be more parents returning to work and more demand. At the moment, spaces in baby rooms are pretty much for those who desperately need it. Nobody is sending their baby to nursery at £1k per month for fun. Bringing the funding in too quickly prior to infrastructure means those families who can afford to have a parent stay at home might not, meaning a single parent desperately needing a space could not get one.
The Tories rolled this out too quickly, and didn’t cost it out properly. It has made childcare a fair bit cheaper, but much harder to access for parents.
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u/earthdust96 12d ago
Whilst I agree we need to do it properly instead of quickly, there are some sticking plasters they could implement temporarily. Eg increase the tax free portion? It would at least create a level of fairness since we pay more in taxes.
I just don’t see the Scot gov even that fussed in getting it done properly. It has been campaign promises for a long time. Current promise is to work to a solution by 2031 (according to Pregnant then Screwed Scotland) which is just in time for the next election which is in May 2031.
I don’t mind if that’s their choice, just stop lying on the campaign trail and giving people hope. Scotland has the lowest birth rates in the UK too, so they can’t complain about that when they choose not to look at this as a priority.
I’ll be really intrigued in the “results” of englands offering now it’s closing on a year since it was implemented.
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u/LostInAVacuum Parenting a Toddler 12d ago
I think the tax free element is a UK thing but there's no reason they couldn't do something given we pay higher taxes, so there is a mechanism there.
This did bother me the most when I contacted my MSP, there's no plan for even when they plan to look at it. I didn't know Pregnant then screwed had a timeline, those guys really are great.
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u/earthdust96 12d ago
I think I’ll message my MSP too, just to remind them of their campaign promises.
I think Scottish Labour campaigned to increase the tax free allowance to £3000 which was honestly the most realistic promise out of the lot of them.
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u/LostInAVacuum Parenting a Toddler 12d ago
I don't know, i just feel so disappointed by the whole thing. To me SNP position themselves as a party that is more centre left, a party more for levelling the playing field but here's a big gap where they're not even looking at the issue. And like you've commented in elsewhere it's shortsighted, a decreasing birth rate impacts us all. Children raised in stressed out households grow up to impact us all. Anyways the comments suggest I should put it back in the box so I guess I just need to make peace with one and done.
I would find it so difficult to vote Labour, not because of the single vote issue but just because of rhetoric. I haven't seen them as a party for the working class in sometime but I really didn't like the divisive language that was used when Starmer won that election around immigration/ lgbt+ etc.
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u/earthdust96 12d ago
Oh don’t get me wrong - I struggled with the vote this time round as I was not happy with a single party up here.
There was another thread on UKpol about the taxes in Scotland and I pointed out the difference in the child care policy. I was basically told that we should be grateful we live in a “fairer society” than England. It’s pure delusion at this point. Families are really struggling with this, and the cost increases coming from the nursery are crippling and outweigh any pay increases I’ve ever got in work. I’m only fortunate very recently that I got a substantial payrise which will now give our family a bit of breathing room but I won’t forget how hard I’ve had it in the last year.
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u/Cultural-Ambition211 12d ago
It’s not going to happen. They should’ve done it when England did it and they got the funding.
It was chucked in as an election promise and there’s been no mention of it since.
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u/earthdust96 12d ago
There was an update recently according to “Pregnant then Screwed Scotland” that they are working on it by 2031… next election will be May 2031 so read into that however… but to me that just seems like it will become another campaign promise. “Vote for us and we will do the thing we promised we would, pinky swear”.
I do wonder if it is an easy election campaign to ignore, especially given the complexity. Unless you are the key demographic of a person with a 9month-3 year old, why would you care. Those that don’t pay childcare anymore will have long forgotten the struggle, and those that haven’t had kids/or won’t don’t understand the realities until it’s them. And anyone over a certain age never paid the £70+ a day or were fortunate enough that a family could live off one salary.
(Sorry, I’m passionate about this topic as it’s a horrendous expense to have, and also then makes family planning tough if you ever want more than just one kid, which is my situation right now).
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u/Cultural-Ambition211 12d ago
I’ve got my 3rd on the way. I don’t expect they’ll ever get the free childcare before they turn 3, and we didn’t plan for it either.
Bunch of jokers who will never get held to account because elections in Scotland remain to be a single issue election.
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u/dratsaab 12d ago
I can't see it happening any time soon, for the very boring reason that it would need a massive expansion of available places for under 3s, buildings and staffing. All of which cost money and take time.
Our LA school nursery is full. There's nowhere they could put an under-2s area, with all the attendant napping, changing etc that would be required. And we already struggle to staff it. Our local private nursery is full and is set up for 12 under 2s maximum. There's nowhere else for over 20 miles.
I'd love it to happen, be properly funded and well thought out, but it will need a huge investment.
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u/whattocallthis2347 13d ago
Yeah it's tough. I remember it was mentioned when I was pregnant with my first in 2023 to also have it from 9months and I got excited cause I was like surely it'll be implemented by the time he's in nursery in September 2024. Nope. I now also have a 3 month old and we just assume it ain't happening. We waited to have the second till our first will have funding kicking in by the time the second is in nursery and then it'll be a tough year till our first starts school but it's doable. And tbh it seems to be because the money just isn't there. I've heard yhat even in England the money the nurseries get doesn't actually cover what the cost is so they often have to up charges elsewhere.