Cameron admits doubling childcare will ‘take time’

The prime minister wants working parents of three and four-year-olds in some parts of England to be entitled to childcare for 30 hours a week from September 2016 – earlier than previously predicted.

Up to 600,000 families are expected by ministers to benefit from the policy, which will be worth about £2,500 a year on top of the £2,500 they can already save from existing free childcare offers.

But the Pre-School Learning Alliance – which represents 14,000 private, voluntary and independent groups – warned that the existing free childcare provision of 15 hours a week is already “grossly underfunded” by the government.

Research for the charity has suggested the total cost to the sector will be about £1.95bn a year. Funding at current levels amounts to £1.7bn, leaving a potential shortfall of £250m.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy asks Sam Gyimah, the childcare and education minister, whether the government favours working mums over those who stay at home

Mr Cameron said many parents would be “very excited” about the opportunities the policy would give them.

But he admitted: “It is going to take time to get this right, because obviously we need an expansion of the childcare sector.

“We need them [providers] to expand and so we are going to start talking to them immediately about what is the best way of making sure they are being paid properly for the level of childcare they provide.”