{"id":61670,"date":"2026-09-28T17:23:46","date_gmt":"2026-09-28T17:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/flying-start-brand-to-be-ditched-for-two-year-old-childcare-in-wales\/"},"modified":"2026-09-28T17:23:46","modified_gmt":"2026-09-28T17:23:46","slug":"flying-start-brand-to-be-ditched-for-two-year-old-childcare-in-wales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/flying-start-brand-to-be-ditched-for-two-year-old-childcare-in-wales\/","title":{"rendered":"Flying Start brand to be ditched for two-year-old childcare in Wales"},"content":{"rendered":"


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The Welsh government has asked councils to rebrand the childcare they provide for two-year-olds, dropping the name Flying Start.<\/b><\/p>\n

In the guidance, ministers told local authorities to start using the term “Welsh government-funded childcare”.<\/p>\n

However, Flying Start’s other services – such as its health visiting provision – will remain with the same name, according to the guidance.<\/p>\n

The scheme was a flagship policy under the previous Labour-run administration. Labour has said cutting it would be a red line in budget negotiations<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Welsh government said it was supporting “clear, consistent” communication.<\/p>\n

Welsh Labour leader Ken Skates said there was a “huge amount of confusion” and demanded “answers” from the government about the future of the programme.<\/p>\n

The guidance, first reported by the Senedd Sources, external<\/span><\/a> podcast, follows a political row after a Welsh government minister failed to rule out cutting or changing Flying Start.<\/p>\n

The Welsh government needs the help of at least one opposition party to get its budget through next March, and is in talks with multiple parties.<\/p>\n

Flying Start began in 2007 as an early-years programme aimed at disadvantaged parts of Wales, to help with language, social and physical development. <\/p>\n

Childcare for two-year-olds is already provided under the Flying Start umbrella, and the scheme is now being used by the Welsh government to expand childcare to all two-year-olds for 12.5 hours a week.<\/p>\n

By the end of this Senedd term in 2030, the Welsh government hopes to be providing universal childcare from nine months to four years for 20 hours a week.<\/p>\n

This would be in addition to existing provision for parents in work or education for 30 hours a week for three to four-year-olds.<\/p>\n

The guidance says the government is developing a new brand for all Welsh government-funded childcare to provide a “recognisable” experience.<\/p>\n

It said: “To help prepare for this transition and ensure parents and carers across Wales receive clear and consistent information, we need you to start using the term ‘Welsh government-funded childcare’ instead of ‘Flying Start childcare’ when specifically referring to the expansion of 12.5 hours of Welsh government-funded childcare to all two-year-olds.”<\/p>\n

“This guidance does not represent a change to the Flying Start core programme,” it adds.<\/p>\n

“While the expansion of funded childcare to two-year-olds is being delivered through Flying Start, our research suggests that parents are more likely to understand and search for information using the term ‘funded childcare’ or ‘government-funded childcare’ than programme-specific terminology.”<\/p>\n

The guidance said Flying Start can continue to be used when referring to the wider Flying Start programme.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Welsh government has asked councils to rebrand the childcare they provide for two-year-olds, dropping the name Flying Start. In the guidance, ministers told local authorities to start using the term “Welsh government-funded childcare”. However, Flying Start’s other services – such as its health visiting provision – will remain with the same name, according to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":61671,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[7024,2466,16904,2544,1486,5518,312],"class_list":["post-61670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wales","tag-brand","tag-childcare","tag-ditched","tag-flying","tag-start","tag-twoyearold","tag-wales"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61670"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61670\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":61672,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61670\/revisions\/61672"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}