Yesterday (25 March), the Department for Education (DfE) announced a new Inclusive Early Years Fund (IEYF) as part of their wider Inclusive Mainstream Fund for educational settings in England.  

The fund will provide £47 million of additional funding to all local authorities in England. Local authorities will be responsible for allocating the funds to early years settings in 2026 to 2027, with the aim for the funding to transform physical spaces in early years settings and make them more inclusive for children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND).  

Local authorities have been advised to prioritise settings that can make large-scale change for the largest number of children with SEND and to allocate around £1000 per setting to ensure children with SEND have access to local early years settings that are equipped to meet their needs.

The DfE have acknowledged that it is unlikely that childminders and smaller settings will receive IEYF funding. As such, they have committed to ensuring childminders are also supported to make their settings accessible to children with SEND and are developing a dedicated package of support for smaller settings. This includes access to training, early identification, smoother transitions, and access to specialist advice. 

The IEYF is allocated alongside existing funding streams including SEND Inclusion Fund (SENIF), Disability Access Fund (DAF), Early Years Pupil Premium (EYPP) and High Needs Funding.

Ka Lai Brightley-Hodges, Head of Coram PACEY comments:

“Yesterday’s announcement of a new Inclusive Early Years Fund (IEYF) is crucial to ensure children with SEND can access local early years settings that meets their needs. We know that change needs to happen for children, parents and providers and greater investment will support this, alongside the longer term SEND reforms the government are rolling out.

We spoke with the DfE before the announcement about the fund and whilst we understand the need to place the funds in larger settings where it can reach more children, it is difficult to accept that childminders and the children they care for will likely not be able to take advantage of it. However, we will be supporting the DfE to consult with childminders to understand how they can individually be supported with their SEND provision. This may include an increased take up of existing funding streams and better support from local authorities to implement SEND provision.

There is a lot more work to do to understand how we can all support childminders to offer or increase their SEND provision as it can be so different to group settings and other PVI providers. Whilst childminders are currently underutilised in this area, we truly believe that they are often best placed to care for children with SEND, but they need the right support to deliver this on a bigger scale for greater impact.

We will continue to work with the DfE to ensure that childminders play an important role in the SEND reforms and most importantly are adequately supported to continue to offer specialised care to children who need it most.”