COUNCIL bosses would need £6 million more every year to meet the demand of providing a 30 hours per week childcare service to all three and four-year-olds in Inverclyde - at a time when their budget is being slashed by an identical amount of money.

A new report by education officers says that even by pulling all of their nursery resources together – along with partner childcare places and childminders – they would still need to nearly double existing capacity.

Now both the council leader Stephen McCabe and education convenor Terry Loughran are calling on the Scottish Government to explain how it intends to fund the extended service.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has promised to provide the increase in childcare provision by 2020.

But Councillor McCabe declared: “We will in fact have to almost double this service. At the moment it costs around £6 million pounds so we would be looking at another £6 million pounds. This comes at a time when the Scottish Government has reduced our budget by £6 million.

“I am not against increasing childcare to 30 hours. It is a laudable policy and would be very welcome, but I wonder how the Scottish Government plan to fund this?

“We will need to start planning to get the extra capacity we will need.

“There are some very big questions to be asked.”

At present, all three and four year-olds are entitled to 600 hours per year, but the intention is to increase this to 1,140 hours by 2020.

Education convenor Councillor Loughran, who was presented with the report at a committee meeting, today called for clarity.

He said: “We also have very little capacity in our nurseries – only one of the 19 we own would currently be able to deliver the increase in provision – so we would need to invest a significant amount of money to build the space we need. 

“These are increasingly challenging times for the council, trying to set a balanced budget against mounting pressures on our funding.”
Inverclyde Council is undergoing a major capital investment in their school estate, but this is based on the current numbers in nursery education.

"The Scottish Government insisted that preparations for the increase are well under way and that ministers are committed to fully funding the new provision.

A spokeswoman said: “We are again committed to fully funding this new provision and will work with local government to ensure the extra money being provided is used to create the new places.

"We are already working with local government to plan for a significant infrastructure expansion to meet the increased demand and to ensure the extra money being provided is used to create the new places.”

In recent years the number of hours nursery children are entitled to has increased by 45 per cent.