This report is a plan for delivering change through a National Childcare Service in public provision, as a replacement for the fragmented, haphazard and unequal nature of the childcare sector at present. The report provides a comprehensive, costed strategy for achieving this transformation.
The target to double childcare provision will require radical changes to the infrastructure to deliver that care. Current architecture cannot be easily or simply scaled up. Current plans would place the burden of funding the changes on Local Authorities without giving them additional resources to cover it. A National Childcare Service could be established by 2020 to deliver these services. The buy-out and nationalisation of private childcare services would be optional though services that refuse would have to demonstrate that they meet or exceed the standards of care offered by the national service to qualify for state funding. In societies that have high levels of equality, fairness and prosperity, early years learning and care is treated with the same seriousness as school education. Setting our ambitions any lower than this would be a dereliction of our responsibilities to future generations of Scots.