It’s not just in the South of England that we are seeing ‘hugely competitive buyer appetite at present’ (online, 2 November). In the past three weeks, Nursery World has reported on a raft of new nursery acquisitions, with groups throughout the country considerably expanding their places. There seems to be no halting this consolidation, with groups now accounting for more than 50 per cent of childcare on non-domestic premises – and rising fast.
Waking up to this market development, Ofsted is calling for ‘stronger oversight’ of multiples as part of its individual inspections, whereby it will seek to monitor how decisions made centrally affect the care and education of children in individual sites (see Interview, page 13).
Inevitably the increasing power of the groups is identified as a worrying development by some in early years, who see it as private, for-profit enterprise encroaching on what should be a public service, accessible to all. With their growing monopoly on the workforce, chains have a renewed responsibility to fulfil local sufficiency, set wage levels and invest in skills. This is a weighty challenge.
Significantly, Ofsted will be seeking to join up its intelligence about groups regionally to understand the bigger picture. This is particularly important in light of fears that the dominance of the chains could result in inequality of access across the UK as they target areas where better-off working families can afford to use childcare.
In the course of its research, Ofsted found that some multiples are working with local authorities to acquire or open nurseries in areas of deprivation, and the majority of managers surveyed said they believed their group ‘served community needs well’.
Let’s hope this approach can be squared with a business model that has to adhere to the bottom line.
