Bridget Phillipson’s proposal to extend 30 free hours of childcare to families on benefits is lunacy. Over eight years working on and off in childcare, as both a nanny and in nursery settings, I spent countless hours changing nappies and managing meltdowns, including leading the two-to-three-year-olds class of a nursery in a town made famous by Raoul Moat’s shooting spree. More often than anyone in Whitehall would care to admit, I was raising other people’s children for most of their waking week. What I saw in my time working in the nursery makes me convinced the Education Secretary’s proposal is a bad idea.

Into this mess, Phillipson proposes more free hours, for more families, delivered by a workforce that does not exist

Working parents pay eye-watering sums for full-time childcare, often thousands – or even tens of thousands – of pounds a year, while funding “free” places for others through their taxes, and rightly, targeted support for working families is necessary. Some mothers handed their children over to me in tears, knowing they had no choice but to return to work to keep their households afloat. At the same door, non-working parents dropped off their toddlers for funded hours and cheerfully described days of errands and shopping ahead. In both camps, there were excellent, loving parents, but the system unfairly forced one group to effectively subsidise the other, denying them much-desired time with their own children.

Phillipson argues her offer will help close the attainment gap. Is that all that matters? One little boy in my care spent 50 hours a week in nursery. I fed him three meals a day and rocked him to sleep. I could predict his mood or when he was coming down with something, knew before his parents when he was ready to potty train, heard him learn and repeat the refrains from his favourite stories. Over time, his emotional attachment shifted from his family towards the staff. His mother noticed. It broke both of our hearts to witness.

There is an unwillingness to admit that for very young children, being raised primarily by their parents is better. Research highlighted by Stanford economist Eric Bettinger shows the long-term benefits of stay-at-home parents for child development. Successive UK governments, however, treat parental care as a problem to be solved, rather than something to be supported. Every policy sold to us as “supporting parents” only supports them back into the workplace, and away from their children.

And what of the workforce expected to deliver this new “universal” system? My starting wage as an apprentice nursery practitioner was £3.90 an hour. After qualifying, pay rises to the minimum wage, for work that is physically exhausting and emotionally draining. Responsibility for the safety and nurture of tiny lives is not a light one. At 21, I left my job and my 12 little pupils, whom I cared for immensely, because I could not afford to stay. That story is repeated across the country.

The answers offered by ministers are technocratic. Those who have never worked in the industry suggest stretching ratios or dangling small bonuses in deprived areas to attract staff.

In 2023, then chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced an optional change to childcare ratios from 1:4 to 1:5 for two-year-olds. On paper, this sounds like a problem solved. In practice, it was anything but. I would like to see him try it. Work ten hours with five two-year-olds. Take only half an hour for lunch. Change every nappy, feed every child, settle them all to sleep, and spend the rest of the day stopping them from hurting themselves or each other. Don’t forget to help them reach every developmental goal and teach them about both British values and other cultures, when they can’t even buckle their shoes. Add in the reality that at least one of those children may well have special educational needs.

Today, the sector is buckling. “Free hours” are often funded below cost, which forces nurseries to operate at a loss or shut their doors. Closures are surging, creating childcare deserts with no provision for those who need it, and leaving parents applying for childcare places the moment those two blue lines appear on a stick. The state promises ever more while the system has less and less capacity to deliver.

Into this mess, Phillipson proposes more free hours, for more families, delivered by a workforce that does not exist, in settings that are already closing. She clearly believes supply will somehow materialise according to her wishes.

Supporters of extending free childcare to families on benefits claim this is fairer on children. They all deserve the equal opportunity to be separated from their parents and raised by professionals. In reality, it asks working families to pay more and childcare workers to cope with more demand.

This is a refusal to confront the limits of the industry, which has gradually evolved from a necessity for working parents to a right for all. The truth is that no amount of state provision can replace a parent, and no amount of funding can fill the hole that successive governments are digging us into.