A Newcastle MP led a debate in Parliament amid Government proposals to cut childcare costs by increasing the number of children childcare workers care for.
Newcastle North MP and Chair of the Petitions Committee, Catherine McKinnell, spoke on behalf of 109,000 petitioners against the Government's plans to change minimum staff-child ratios in England for two-year-olds from 1:4 to 1:5.
The petition, started by Zoe and Lewis Steeper, was launched after the couple's nine-month-old son, Oliver, tragically died after a medical emergency in a nursery.
Read more: Hundreds of mums march through Newcastle as they demand more help from the Government
Speaking at the debate, Ms McKinnell said: "We need to stop thinking of childcare as some sort of luxury, but instead as the fundamental foundation for the best start in life, and the best chance for our economy.
"Quality early education is a key determiner for important life outcomes for children. For parents too, access to childcare can shape their future as parents, allowing them to flexibly to choose if and when they want to work.
"Yet, when we look at which developed countries have the highest childcare costs, the UK consistently ranks among the highest of that list."
She added: "Parents are certainly feeling it. A recent survey by Pregnant Then Screwed found that these costs have forced 43% of mothers to consider leaving their jobs and 40% to work fewer hours.
"Is that not just absurd? That during an unprecedented cost of living crisis, our economy bumping along the bottom, families with young children cannot afford to go to work."
Ms McKinnell, who paid tribute to the Steeper in her debate, also highlighted that the proposals concerned parents. Last month thousands of parents took to the streets to join a nationwide protest calling for the Government to reform childcare, parental leave and flexible working.
In Newcastle, parents marched down Northumberland Street with placards and held speeches at Grey's Monument to highlight the issue.
Ms McKinnell said: "When parents take their child to nursery, they trust that they will be provided the best possible care. They also have trust that our whole system will always prioritise children and their safety. Parents understandably feel that the proposed changes risk betraying that trust."
She said: "It is not just a child's wellbeing that deregulating childcare ratios would endanger. It could also jeopardise the quality of early years care for many and create a postcode lottery of early years quality depending on a parent's ability to pay.
"Early education is vital for our children to the best a fair start in life. It is also important for our children to have a fair start to life, and that this is universal across the board.
"Evidence consistently proves that a child's cognitive development and social behavioural outcomes are largely determined by the early years input they receive.
"Quality early years education requires that staff can give each child the right care and attention, whilst identifying and supporting a child’s individual needs. It means children feeling safe, secure, and able to learn with well managed risk-taking, which is inherent in any play-based activities, so that a child can independently play, learn, discover and explore."
Ms McKinnell added: "Early years provision is not working. It isn't working for families, it isn't working for providers, and it isn't working for the economy.
"Parents are facing such extraordinary costs they have become unable to work. Providers are being pushed into debt with rising numbers of closures.
"The overworked and underappreciated workforce are at breaking point. And children are being denied the best possible early education.
"Childcare is a vital social and economic infrastructure, as important for our country as the roads, rail, and our healthcare system. But the sector is crying out for support. We are in desperate need for a system which truly reflects the needs of modern families.
"Yet the only solution the Government has offered misses the point entirely. A pledge to relax childcare ratios which does not address the cause of this crisis and will only make it worse.
"Deregulation of our childcare ratios will risk the safety of our children, jeopardise their development, and could engender a workforce crisis bigger than that the sector is already facing.
"The proposal is premised on falsehoods and misleading comparisons, and the likelihood that they could even be implemented is doubtful. The Government should be taking every possible opportunity to strengthen our childcare system and improve the quality of early years provision. Instead, it is doing what it can to get rid of standards altogether – a race to the bottom in which our children will be the biggest losers."
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