Child care exchange

[HerneHillGem]

Hi,

I am a new mum who will be returning to work in September when my son will be 7 months old. I'm currently looking for childcare but am finding it all a bit expensive. I was wondering if anybody else felt the same and wanted to do a child care exchange, where I looked after your little one for one or two days a week in exchange for you looking after my little boy.

I will be working Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and my mum will hopefully be looking after him for one of these days. I'm a primary school teacher specialising in the early years so am CRB checked and have plenty of experience of working with little ones.

Has anyone heard of schemes like this or would be interested? I've checked with OFSTED that this is Ok, and as long as no money is exchanged, then it is all above board.

[etta166]

This always sounded great to me, in theory, but I think that you actually have to register as a childminder to do this if you want it to be all above board. At least, that is the case if you look after the other child in your house. I think that if you go to the other house then you are OK not to register with Ofsted, but I'm not 100% on that.

Good luck finding someone else to share with, it sounds like a perfect childcare option if you can make it work.

[lucyA1308]

In the good old days (i.e. when I was a child) my mum and her friends did this all the time. I think now there are more stringent rules about being registered etc, but if you are CRB checked, then you might be OK.

I would say that the only drawback is that it sounds a nice idea, but you could often be let down by the other person, when it is an arrangement like this, rather than one where money is exchanged, and when there is an obligation.

[Fuschia]

Ofsted dropped pursuit of parents doing child care swaps, in the end

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8303366.stm

[HerneHillGem]

One of the girls from my anti-natal group who is a lawyer is looking into the legalities, but I believe that idea that people couldn't exchange child care was dropped after Ed Balls intervened and OFSTED changed their policy. It was absolutely ludicrous that those two ladies were prosecuted in the first place!

[Saffron]

Yes, I read the Ed Balls interview some time ago. My understanding was that he concluded that prohibition on childcare exchange was not in the spirit in which the childcare laws were written, and that prohibiting such exchange in itself had no legal grounds.

The excerpts in Fuschia's BBC article say it very succintly:

Inspectors should not interfere in private arrangements between friends looking after each other's children, says Children's Secretary Ed Balls.

This follows the case of policewomen who were told that helping each other with babysitting was illegal if they were not registered.

Mr Balls has written to England's inspectorate, Ofsted, to say this is not the intention of childcare law.

Such arrangements "should not be a matter for regulation," he says.

Speaking in the House of Commons, the children's secretary told MPs that he had written to Ofsted chief, Christine Gilbert, to clarify the rules on informal arrangements for looking after children.

Mr Balls said he wanted "to make clear that reciprocal childcare arrangements between parents where there is no payment involved should not be a matter for regulation".

"I have agreed today with Ofsted that with immediate effect, this will be beyond the scope of their childcare inspections and will make this crystal clear by changing the regulations in the coming period."

[HerneHillGem]

Just rang OFSTED, they said it's totally fine as long as no payment is exchanged, such as money or even a box of chocs etc. As long as it's just childcare people are exchanging they have no problem with it. Yay!

[esme]

Fab idea, if I go down to a shorter week I will get in touch! :)

[HerneHillGem]

Thanks for everyone's interest so far. As I'm working Wednesday - Friday I would be ideally looking to do two days each. If this would suit you, get in touch!