Jane Hutt, minister for children, said the Welsh Assembly will consult on how much the grant should be and added that the country's 22 local childcare partnerships have been given an extra 6,000 to allow them to publicise the initiative beforehand.
She said, 'Childminders play a vital role in children's services, and I hope my announcement will help increase the number of childminders in Wales.'
Sian Davies, development manager at the National Childminding Association's (NCMA) Welsh Office in Cardiff, said she was delighted with the decision and hoped the start-up grants would stem the fall in the number of childminders in Wales, which currently stands below 3,000. She said, 'Local authority figures for 1999 in the Early Years National Training Organisation workforce survey showed there were 3,770 childminders in the whole of Wales. However, according to NCMA figures published in June, this fell by almost 1,000 in two years to 2,792 - a total drop of more than 25 per cent and a loss of 6,000 childcare places.'
The move will bring Wales in line with Northern Ireland and England, which both introduced start-up grants for childminders last year. Gill Haynes, NCMA chief executive, said its membership in England had 'increased dramatically over the past year' as a result of the scheme, which gives prospective childminders start-up grants of around 300.
In Northern Ireland, where the scheme was introduced in January 2000, the first review of its first 20 months of operation has just been published by the Northern Ireland Childminding Association (NICMA). Its figures show that 485 start-up grants were issued, resulting in 1,373 new places for children aged nought to 12 up to the end of August 2001, and that the average grant per applicant was for 144.15.
Bridget Nodder, NICMA director, admitted that the scheme had not resulted in a huge net gain of new childminders but said that it had stopped a drop in numbers. She said, 'The number of childminders in Northern Ireland is remaining fairly static. However, in March 2001 there were 4,234 childminders across the four health boards, up 200 on the previous year.' Scotland has no national start-up grant scheme, but some local authorities allocate funding where needed for childminders out of their budgets. Maggie Simpson, national development officer of the Scottish Childminding Association, said some local authorities also gave additional support for months afterwards. 'In rural Dumfries and Galloway, for example, new childminders get start-up grants plus a subsidy for their first six months to help them reach break-even point and become viable,' she said.
She said she was unaware of any Scottish Executive plans for a national start-up grant scheme.
* See letters on pages 34 and 35.
