You've now got 20% more kids in infant schools and need an extra tranche of teachers to look after them. You also need more facilities in the school - extra space for the extra classes, dealing with things that schools don't generally have to deal with like nappy changing etc. Oh and you'll have to pay all those extra teachers more money because they'll be officially working longer hours.

I'm sure we can do all that. OK, first question, where's the money going to come from?

I went to school at 2.5 years old, all schools in France provide this service for free.

Well, it wasn't 'free', your parents just didn't get handed a bill at the end of the week for it. It was paid for out of taxation. I actually think putting children in a school environment (i.e. a formal learning environment) earlier might be a good thing or a bad thing, I suspect it can depend on the child. But putting every 2 year old in a school without massive extra expenditure is just.. well, frankly, they're not actually planning to do it. It's a soundbite headline to convince gullible people that they're actually thinking about things. With this and the 'make state schools as good as private schools' and 'go back to old-fashioned discipline in schools' headlines, it's patently Gove's turn to do the Newsnight/Today programme/Andrew Marr merry-go-round.

I personally like to believe that this government will wake up and do something for the common good at some point.

I'm sure we can do all that.

OK, first question, where's the money going to come from?

Teachers are educators, not child-care specialists.
Granted, for the younger pupils a certain amount of child-care is provided, but that is not their (the staff) main duty.
Can we get back to having schools that educate are are not there as overflow for childcare crisis?

If the issue is with affordable child-care facilities, tackle that, don't add yet more burden on already overworked school staff.
This is tantamount to saying "oh look, we have a problem here but let's just palm it off on some other people without actually tackling the issue at hand".

Mark

Thinking that kids can't be educated before 5 is ridiculous too.

Preschool education is one of the most effective available policies for relieving the lifetime effects of poverty and increasing social mobility.
But only when done the expensive way with well qualified staff, small class sizes and a structured program.
This is confirmed by lots of studies.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2528798/

A basic plan of using school buildings for childcare, and contracting out the staffing is ok. Charge parents a peppercorn fee to offset some of the cost, with oversight provided by the school's head teacher makes some sense. It shouldn't cost all that much and allows lots of parents to work if they want which should, at the very least, neutralize the cost to the wider economy making it all revenue neutral very quickly.

But extra money to provide intervention educational services for poorer kids (centrally funded) would be a brilliant investment.

My concern - not one which your economic argument seems to appreciate

is that someone is proposing that two year olds don’t get the contact with their parents that they surely need at that young age. If you have children, then you must surely be prepared to take on the responsibility to look after and care for your child. That means adjusting your work patterns to sit the needs of your child. As Mark rightly says, schools are for educating, not some kind of free child minding service.

(centrally funded) would be a brilliant investment.