Nothing can prepare you for the birth of your first child – the joy, the horror, the total discombobulation, but also the humbling awareness of just how little you knew about the realities of raising children. Tired babies do not, as I had expected, just “nod off”. Nor do all newborns love the car (mine screamed with such ear-shattering persistence we had to stop driving). But ask any expectant parent about the state of British childcare and you will settle upon a seemingly universal understanding: the system is woefully unfit for purpose.
After a Brexit exodus decimated staffing levels in nurseries, the pandemic quietly pushed the early years sector past the point of no return, and this winter promises even more hardship. Deliberate underfunding means providers have little choice but to charge astronomical fees, which have increased at a rate that far outstrips wages, to cover their own sizeable outgoings. And as energy prices rise, so too will costs.
