The London Childcare Strategy

High childcare costs in London, coupled with the high costs of housing, are keeping thousands of parents out of paid employment and training. Government assistance, in the form of tax credits, is proving less successful in London than in other parts of the country. The lack of paid employment for parents, especially mothers, is the major factor leading to London having the highest rates of child poverty in the country.

The London Childcare Strategy: Towards affordable good quality childcare for all is designed to increase the availability of quality childcare provision in London and to make it more affordable by parents. It also seeks to promote family friendly employment practices to enable parents to balance work and family life. The development of the strategy was funded by the London Development Agency, which will be a major partner in delivering the strategy. The strategy was published on 11 November 2003.

The Mayor launched the draft Childcare Strategy for public consultation at the capitalwoman event on 8 March 2003, and it was distributed to participants at the conference and a wide range of organisations afterwards. Londoners were invited to email the Mayor with their comments by 9 June 2003. The views received were taken into account in the final version of the strategy.

Downloading the document

The London Childcare Strategy may be downloaded as PDF and RTF files:

London Childcare Strategy PDF
London Childcare Strategy RTF

Printed copies, alternative formats and languages

A limited number of printed copies of the Childcare Strategy document are available via the Public Liaison Unit, tel. 020 7983 4100, Minicom 020 7983 4458.

The strategy is available on request in the following formats and languages: large print, Braille, disc, audiotape, sign language video, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese, Greek, Gujurati, Hindi, Punjabi, Turkish, Urdu, Vietnamese. Please contact the Public Liaison Unit stating the language or format you require.