In March 1981 a new Labour administration was elected to the Greater London Council (GLC) and Ken Livingstone became leader of the council. The left-wing of the Labour Party now controlled both the GLC and the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA). This was significant for childcare campaigners in the city, as it was for other progressive causes and groups.

From the beginning of the new administration, the London Region of the National Childcare Campaign lobbied the new Greater London Council and Inner London Education Authority (ILEA). They expressed their concern to Bryn Davies, chairman of ILEA ‘that there is not enough discussion of childcare in the GLC manifesto. We consider that decent childcare facilities are absolutely necessary and central to women’s equality, and we object to the pernicious distinction between ‘care’ and ‘education’ which underpins much of ILEA’s nursery provision.’ They offered to contribute the expertise of the campaign to policy.

Between July and November 1982 meetings were held to establish how the GLC Women’s Committee would work in a more open and consultative way. A co-ordinating group worked in parallel with the Women’s Committee to draw together issues and suggestions brought up by working groups, help formulate policies, monitor implementation, select eight women for co-option to the Women’s Committee and help formulate agendas for the Women’s Committee. The Co-ordinating Group was open to all women to attend, although to ensure continuity it included at least one delegate from each working group, including the Childcare Working Group, and other women’s groups including the National Childcare Campaign. ¹

The Childcare Working Group defined itself as ‘concerned with the daycare and education needs of children aged 0-16.’ The National Childcare Campaign joined the Childcare Working Group along with other organisations to influence the direction of childcare policy.

The working group wrote:

‘The GLC is a political body and the Women’s Committee should be working within the context of an existing and developing manifesto. The GLC has a strategic role to play in promoting positive socialist alternatives in all its spheres of interest including childcare. Furthermore the Women’s Committee has the important task of publicly demonstrating the crucial significance that childcare provision has for any initiatives concerned with promoting equality of opportunity for women.

To this end the GLC Childcare Working Group intends to work to identify ways in which the GLC can promote and support childcare initiatives which consciously address themselves to the following criteria:-

- Anti-racist and anti-sexist childcare practices

- Improved status, training and conditions for childcare workers

- Encouraging the direct involvement of parents in planning and controlling provision which meets their needs

- The particular requirements of children with special needs

- Facilitating the integration of nursery education and daycare.’

The Childcare Working Group wanted to see the GLC set an example in its working practices by enabling parents to combine employment and childcare. The working group wanted to see childcare being considered by all of the GLC Committees, not just the Women’s Committee. They hoped the Industry and Employment Committee would ‘place childcare in the economic sector, creating new jobs in childcare.’  The working group wanted to see funds used to develop childcare in line with the criteria above, and not only increase existing provision, writing ‘it is crucial for the GLC to take any opportunity to support and consolidate the development of radically different forms of childcare.

The GLC Women’s Committee made childcare a priority for its funding programme because, as they wrote in a document titled ‘Childcare: the need for’, ‘one of the greatest obstacles to women’s equality is the prevailing view that childcare is a woman’s issue. They also noted that while they could not provide childcare themselves on a large scale, they wanted to fund this area because ‘there are an enormous number of exciting ideas about childcare and childcare projects which have been developed by women.’

In its November / December 1983 Bulletin the Women’s Committee reported that childcare projects claimed over 55% of the Committee’s budget for grant-aiding voluntary organisations in London from 1983-84. £3.6 million was allocated to childcare in 1983-4 and almost £4 million from 1984-5. Over 140 groups were funded by the end of 1983. ²

The types of groups they funded included day care for under-fives, such as community nurseries, day nurseries, extended hours playgroups and support to childminders but also covered many other kinds of projects for children of all ages: wrap around provision for school-age children, creches ‘to enable women to participate fully in public life (and creches accompanying training courses), play activities and groups for stay-at-home parents (women) and small children, toy libraries and playbuses and holiday projects.

The Women’s Committee recognised that they could only fund groups that already existed, meaning areas with the least childcare provision were at risk of being further disadvantaged. To combat this they funded a development worker post at the National Child Care Campaign to ‘act as a catalyst in the formation of local campaigns.’ ³

As well as funding posts at the National Child Care Campaign and its Black Working Group, the GLC Women’s Committee gave the campaign free accommodation in Wesley House, in Holborn, central London, a building it purchased to safeguard the future of the Kingsway Children’s Centre. Wesley House became the London Women’s Centre and also housed the Fleet Street Nursery, as well as many other women's organisations.

The GLC’s London Industrial Strategy document on Domestic Work and Childcare outlined that the GLC saw childcare as an issue of employment as well as one of need, as the Childcare Working Group had hoped. The strategy made improvement of employment conditions in the groups they funded a priority, and also funded training for childcare workers with the aim of developing non-sexist, non-racist childcare. Although most GLC funding for childcare came from the Women’s Committee, the Industry and Employment Committee funded several childcare projects such as workplace creches and campaigns, while the Greater London Enterprise Board (GLEB) and the Greater London Training Board provided funds for childcare within the employment and training schemes they funded.

GLC grants came with some stipulations, amongst them that funded projects must adhere to high quality standards laid down in guidelines, they were expected to emphasise ‘anti-racist, anti-sexist childcare practices’, children must be treated with respect (no corporal punishment), disabled children should be included, pay, qualifications and conditions of service for employees should be equal to statutory services, projects should be equal opportunity employers, there should be an emphasis on integrating education and childcare, parents should be encouraged to be involved in planning and controlling the childcare provision.

Priority was being given to applicants who

- ‘offered full-time provision, with flexible hours, catering for a comprehensive age range, to enable children to benefit from collective childcare and parents to have a choice to suit their needs.’

- Operated in areas with a shortage of provision

- Benefited ‘particularly oppressed groups’

- Used innovative methods

They also funded development workers in areas where they thought there might be the greatest need for more childcare. ⁴

They were also interested in the question of training for childcare workers, writing in ‘Childcare: a need for’ that ‘the existing anomalies between the training and status of childcare workers in varying types of provision throughout London (e.g. nursery nurses, teachers, playgroup workers, childminders) would be removed by creating a single integrated profession with common-core training and unified conditions of work.’ However, they noted that responsibility for this was split between different government departments and there was ‘little will’ to change the situation.

Although the GLC was not an Education Authority, they saw opportunities to support both ‘informal in-service’ training schemes and more formal training schemes.

The Childcare Advisory Group continued meeting during this period until the abolition of the GLC. Minutes of meetings held on 26 January 1984 and November 28, 1985, show the meetings were well attended with over twenty representatives from the Women’s Committee Support Unit, the National Childcare Campaign, Inner London Education Authority (ILEA), some local authorities and many local childcare organisations. A meeting on 28 November 1985 discussed anti-racist and anti-sexist resources with a report from a meeting with Building Blocks, contributions from representatives from the ILEA, an Equal Opportunities Adviser and Femi Otitoju, an outreach worker in the GLC Women’s Committee Support Unit who spoke about the portrayal of lesbians and gay men in schools including nurseries. ⁵

Footnotes

1. National Child Care Campaign’s London Newsheet (undated), Box 3, Pamela Calder archive, Grow Your Own, Bishopsgate Institute
2. GLC Women’s Committee Bulletin, Issue 12, Nov/Dec 1983, Box 1, Pamela Calder archive, Grow Your Own, Bishopsgate Institute
3. GLC Women’s Committee: A Report Women and Employment Report No.W574, Helen Penn archive, Grow Your Own, Bishopsgate Institute
4. GLC Women’s Committee Bulletin, Issue 12, Nov/Dec 1983
5. Childcare Advisory Group, minutes of meetings 26.01.1984 and 28.11.1985, Box 3, Pamela Calder archive, Grow Your Own, Bishopsgate Institute