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Childcare Bill

This debate is important; it emphasises the lack of childcare expertise in this country, something that we have debated throughout the Bill’s proceedings. I have visited prisons, children’s homes and secure units with inspectors of various inspectorates and have been very impressed by those inspectors. When I spoke to one of them, a teacher, she said that she had been asked to inspect an old people’s home but had declined because she did not feel that she had the relevant experience. In one sense that points to the system being effective, but there was a fault in that she was asked to do something that, in her view, she was not capable of doing well. It is important to bear in mind the pressures put on Ofsted. Fairly recently it reduced its number of offices from eight to three. It has experienced the Gershon review and is expanding its responsibilities. It is also being asked to take on further significant efficiency savings. That is an important context when it comes to thinking about how effective Ofsted inspections may be in future.