Free child care from SNP would send women back to work in droves, claims nursery worker

A nursery worker believes mothers would go back to work in droves if the SNP brought forward its plans for free child care.

Denise Barras believes thousands of women in the Highlands would return to their jobs after maternity leave if they did not have to pay up to £700-per-month for a childminder.

The Inverness Les Enfants group owner believes the ambitious plan could be an independence vote winner. But she said few parents would be hugely attracted the idea of having to wait six years for it to be rolled-out.

"I think if Alex Salmond brought in free child care now, instead of dangling it like a carrot, the vote here in the Highlands would be his," she said.

The First Minister promised half the of two-year-olds would get 600 hours of child care in the first year of a separate Scotland, offered as 15 hours per week during term time.

Mr Salmond said he could double that free allowance to nearly 30 hours per week for all children aged one to school age but that would not be possible until around 2020.

And studies by Parliamentary researchers suggets the plan may be unfeasible.

Specialists in the Scottish Parliament Information Centre said their studies found 104,000 women would need to go to work to make the scheme work.

The also found Scotland only has 64,000 mothers of one to five-year-olds who are economically inactive. And of those, only 14,000 have said they would like to go back to work.

The Scottish Government argued the 104,000 women was "only an estimate". A spokesman said women continue to have babies and drop out of the labour market but the big problem is too many do not come back.

He said the researchers recognised that the policy operated over more than one year and women who re-enter the labour market as a result of free child care, stay in the labour market even when their children get older.

He added: "Without the help we propose, too many never come back into the labour market. Such an expansion is modelled to take place over a number of years. The impacts of such a policy on output and taxation will build over time. And around 55,000 children are born in Scotland. Their mothers will benefit year on year."

Mr Salmond has already delivered a multi-million-pound package of support for children, which will start before the referendum. This includes giving 8400 two-year-olds - from unemployed families - 600 hours of free child care per year and extending free child care hours for three to five- years-olds.

But he said he could not afford to make further improvements unless there is a ‘yes’ vote in September. Opposition leaders accuse him of dangling the universal child care pledge like a carrot for nearly a decade.

His 2007 manifesto promised that an SNP government at a devolved Holyrood would bring in a massive expansion of child care.

Carrianne Matt (41), who co-owns the city’s children’s boutique shop called Piggy in the Middle at Strothers Lane, said hard-pressed parents were struggling with child care.

The mother-of-one, who has not yet decided how she will vote, said: "The government definitely has to readdress this child care promise because parents really need the help now."

Speaking from Inverness at the launch of the Yes Campaign shop in Union Street last month, Mr Salmond said a higher than ever number of women in Scotland were working.

He said: "In the last two years we have reached a record high. There are now more women working in Scotland than any time in history, it’s now almost 70 per cent, which is much higher than the rest of the UK. We say that if you transform child care to Scandinavian levels then we can get an even greater number of woman in the workplace, through choice of course, because many people have to interrupt their careers for significant periods, and many people, because of the cost of child care, are not able to work."

What do you think? Are you a stay-at-home mother? Would you go back to work if child care was free?

Email d.macallister@spp-group.com

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