2.1 The sample
A total of 4,953 parents with children aged 0 to 14 in England were interviewed between April and December 2025.
A probability sample of children aged 0 to 14 in England was drawn from the Child Benefit Register (CBR) maintained by Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs (HMRC) which, given its high take-up, provides extensive coverage of dependent children in England. Interviews were sought with parents of these children. If the sampled child was no longer living at the address, an interview was sought with the current occupiers if they had a child aged 0 to 14, otherwise the address was deemed ineligible[2].
An additional sample of parents in England was drawn from respondents to the Family Resources Survey (FRS) commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), who had consented to be re-contacted for future research[3].
More information about the sample can be found in Section 4.
[2] Prior to the 2019 survey, the sampling unit was the child (rather than the address), and in cases where the sampled child had moved from the sampled address, the child was still considered eligible, and the interviewer attempted to trace the child to his or her new address to conduct an interview there. The sampling unit was changed, from the child to the address, due to the increasing proportion of children that were found to have moved address during fieldwork (from 13% in 2010, to 22% in 2018).
[3]This was necessary because the eligibility criteria for Child Benefit changed in 2013 so that higher-income households (those where one or both partners earn £60,000 or more per year) ceased to gain financially from Child Benefit, resulting in them becoming disproportionately likely to be missing from the CBR. To avoid bias to survey estimates, higher-income households missing from the CBR were sampled from the FRS. For further details see Department for Education (2017) Childcare and early years survey of parents: Sampling frames investigation (opens in new tab)
2.2 The interviews
Interviews were conducted by one of three modes: face-to-face in parents’ homes, by telephone, or by Microsoft Teams. The respondent was a parent or guardian of the sampled child with main or shared responsibility for making childcare decisions, and in most cases (79%) was the child’s mother[4].
The study used an inclusive definition of childcare and early years provision. The respondent was asked to include any time their child was not with them (or their current or ex-spouse or partner), or at school. Prior to the 2019 survey wave, ex-spouses and former partners were included in the definition of informal childcare providers. However, following a user consultation in 2018, these types of providers were excluded from the definition of childcare providers. This change was implemented to align the survey's definition of childcare with other national and international surveys, ensuring consistency and comparability of the collected data.
The definition of childcare covered both informal childcare (for instance grandparents, an older sibling, or a friend or neighbour) and formal childcare (for instance nursery schools and classes, childminders, and before- and after-school clubs). Further detail about this definition is provided in Section 2.3.
In families with two or more children, broad questions were asked about the childcare arrangements of all children, before more detailed questions were asked about the randomly sampled child (henceforth referred to as ‘the selected child’).
Because childcare arrangements vary between school term-time and school holidays, most of the questions focused on the most recent term-time week (the ‘reference week’). Separate questions were asked about the use of childcare during times of the year when school children were on holiday.
The interview covered the following topic areas:
For all families:
- use of childcare and early years provision in the reference term-time week, school holidays periods (if applicable) and the past year;
- payments made for childcare and early years provision (for providers used in the past week), the use of free hours of childcare[5], the use of Tax-Free Childcare, and the use of tax credits and subsidies;
- sources of information about, and attitudes towards, childcare and early years provision in the local area; and
- if applicable, reasons for not using childcare.
For one randomly selected child:
- a detailed record of child attendance in the reference week;
- reasons for using and views of the main formal provider; and
- the home learning environment.
Classification details:
- household composition;
- parents’ education and work details; and
- provider details.
The survey achieved a 50% response rate among all eligible addresses, which were defined as addresses with at least one child aged 0 to 14 years old living there. For further details on response see Chapter 6.
[4] In the Technical Reports for previous waves of CEYSP this figure only included biological children; this wave, to be more inclusive, it includes biological and adopted children. The figure for biological children alone was also 79% this wave.
[5]The official terminology to describe these free hours can change over time e.g. “government funded hours”, “government funded childcare”, “free childcare”, “government funded entitlement to early education”, “free hours” etc. In the CEYSP questionnaire, however, the terminology has always been consistent: “free hours of childcare” (sometimes shortened to just “free hours”). The survey wording is also used in the outputs, including this technical report, so that the survey estimates accord with what parents were asked.
2.3 Defining childcare
The study uses an inclusive definition of childcare and early years provision. Resident parents were asked to include any time that the child was not with them, or their current or ex-partner, or at school. This definition is consistent with the 2019-2021 survey waves but deviates from that used in earlier waves of the survey as described above.
To remind parents to include all possible people or organisations that may have looked after their children, they were shown the following list:
Formal providers
- nursery school
- nursery class attached to a primary or infants’ school
- reception class at a primary or infants’ school
- special day school or nursery or unit for children with special educational needs
- day nursery
- playgroup or pre-school
- childminder
- nanny or au pair
- baby-sitter who came to home
- breakfast club or before school club
- after-school clubs
- holiday club/scheme
Informal providers[6]
- the child’s grandparent(s)
- the child’s older brother/sister
- another relative
- a friend or neighbour
Other
- provider of sport, art, leisure, tuition or religious activities
- other nursery education provider
- other childcare provider
- Prior to the 2023 survey wave, ‘after school clubs and activities’ were grouped and regarded as ‘formal providers’ in the list of childcare providers presented to respondents during the survey interview and used for reporting purposes. For 2023 onwards, the reference to ‘activities’ was removed, so that only ‘after school clubs’ are considered formal providers of childcare. Further information about this change can be found in the Technical Report for the 2023 wave of the survey.
- For the 2024 survey, the category ‘breakfast club’ was expanded to include ‘before school club’ as well i.e. ‘Breakfast clubs or before school clubs’ (as shown above). This change was made to ensure that clubs running before the school day started, which did not offer breakfast, were also accounted for.
[6] Prior to the 2019 wave, the list of informal providers included “my ex-husband/wife/partner/the child’s other parent who does not live in this household”.
Definitions of main formal providers for pre-school children
A short definition for each of the main formal providers for pre-school children is included below. The definitions were not provided to parents in the survey, but these are included here to help the reader differentiate between the most common categories.
- nursery school – this is a school in its own right, with most children aged 3 to 5. Sessions normally run for 2 ½ to 3 hours in the morning and/or afternoon;
- nursery class attached to a primary or infants' school - often a separate unit within the school, with those in the nursery class aged 3 or 4. Sessions normally run for 2½ to 3 hours in the morning and/or afternoon;
- reception class at a primary or infants' school - this usually provides full-time education during normal school hours, and most children in the reception class are aged 4 or 5;
- special day school/nursery or unit for children with special educational needs - a nursery, school or unit for children with special educational needs;
- day nursery - this runs for the whole working day and may be closed for a few weeks in summer, if at all. This may be run by employers, private companies, community/voluntary group or the Local Authority, and can take children who are a few months to 5-years-old; and
- playgroup or pre-school - the term ‘pre-school’ is commonly used to describe many types of nursery education. For the purposes of this survey, pre-school is used to describe a type of playgroup. This service is often run by a community/voluntary group, parents themselves, or privately. Sessions last up to 4 hours.
Providers were classified according to the service for which they were being used by parents, for example day-care or early years education. Thus, providers were classified and referred to in analysis according to terminology such as ‘nursery schools’ and ‘day nurseries’, rather than as forms of integrated provision such as Children’s Centres. Reception classes were only included as childcare if it was not compulsory schooling, that is, the child was aged under 5 (or had turned 5 during the current school term).
This inclusive definition of childcare means that parents will have included time when their child was visiting friends or family, at a sport or leisure activity, and so on. The term early years provision covers both ‘care’ for young children and ‘early years education’.
Deciding on the correct classification of the ‘type’ of provider can be complicated for parents. The classifications given by parents were therefore checked with the providers themselves in a separate telephone survey and edited where necessary. Detail about the provider edits can be found in Section 7.3.
2.4 Interpreting the data in the Official Statistics Report and Tables
Most findings in the Official Statistics Report and Tables relate to one of two levels of analysis:
- the family level (e.g. proportions of families paying for childcare, parents’ perceptions of childcare provision in their local areas); and
- the (selected) child level (e.g. parents’ views on the provision received by the selected child from their main childcare provider).
However, for the analyses presented in the data tables formerly contained in Chapters 9 and 10 covering packages of childcare for children aged 0 to 4 and for children aged 5 to 14, the data was restructured to use 'all children' in the household as the base of analysis[7]. This was done to increase the sample size and enable the exploration of packages of childcare received by children in more detail. The ‘all children’ approach was not used for other analyses due to the more extensive data that was collected on the selected child compared to other children in the household.
Weights
A ‘family-level’ weight is applied to family-level analyses. This ensures the findings are representative of families in England with a child aged 0 to 14 in receipt of Child Benefit.
A ‘child-level’ weight is applied to analyses carried out at the (selected) child-level. This weight combines the family-level weight with an adjustment for the probability of the child being randomly selected for the more detailed questions.
Bases
The data tables show the total number of cases that were analysed (e.g. different types of families, income groups). The total base figures include all the eligible cases (in other words all respondents, or all respondents who were asked the question where it was not asked of all) but usually exclude cases with missing data (codes for ‘don’t know’ or ‘not answered’). Thus, while the base description may be the same across several data tables, the base sizes may differ slightly due to the exclusion of cases with missing data.
Unweighted bases are presented throughout. This is the actual number of parents that responded to a given question for family-level questions, and the actual number of children about whom a response was provided by parents for child-level questions.
In some tables, the column or row bases do not add up to the total base size. This is because some categories might not be included in the table, either because the corresponding numbers are too small to be of interest or the categories are otherwise not useful for the purposes of analysis.
Where a base size contains fewer than 50 respondents, particular care must be taken, as confidence intervals around these estimates will be very wide, and hence the results should be treated with some caution. In tables with bases sizes below 50, these figures are denoted by squared brackets [ ].
Percentages
Due to rounding, percentage figures may not add up to 100 per cent. This also applies to questions where more than one answer can be given (‘multi-coded’ questions).
Continuous data
Some Official Statistics Tables summarise parents’ responses to questions eliciting continuous data; for instance, the number of hours of childcare used per week (see Table 1.12 in the Official Statistics Tables) and the amount paid for childcare per week (see Table 4.6 in the Official Statistics Tables). For these data, both median and mean values are included in the data tables, but median values are reported in the Report as they are less influenced by extreme values and are therefore considered a more appropriate measure of central tendency. It should be noted that ‘outlier’ values, those identified as being either impossible or suspect responses, were removed from the dataset prior to data analysis. As such, the extreme values which remain can be considered as valid responses which lie at the far ends of their respective distributions.
Where significance testing has been conducted on continuous data, this has been carried out using mean values rather than medians. This is because the continuous data is subject to ‘rounding’ by respondents, for instance where payments are rounded to the nearest ten pounds, or where times are rounded to the nearest half hour; this rounding can result in similar median values where the underlying distributions are quite different, and testing for differences between means is more appropriate in these instances as it takes the entire distribution into account. However, although mean values are more influenced than median values by extreme values, significance testing on mean values accounts for extreme values by widening the standard error of the mean, which is used in the calculation of the test statistic, thereby reducing the likelihood of finding a significant result. As such, it is not the case that a significant change will be reported between years or between sub-groups simply due to a small number of respondents reporting an extreme value on a continuous variable.
Statistical significance
Where reported survey results have differed by sub-group, or by survey year, the difference has been tested for significance using Stata 17.0 and found to be statistically significant at the 95 per cent confidence level or above. This means that the chance that the difference is due to sampling error, rather than reflecting a real difference between the sub-groups or survey years, is 1 in 20 or less. Sample stratification, clustering, and weighting are taken into account to correct for non-response bias when conducting significance testing. This means that ‘false positive’ results to significance tests (in other words interpreting a difference as real when it is not) is far less likely than if the standard formulae were used.
Symbols in tables
The symbols below have been used in the tables, and they denote the following:
n/a this category does not apply (given the base of the table)
[ ] percentage based on fewer than 50 respondents (unweighted)
* percentage value of less than 0.5 but greater than zero[8]
0 percentage value of zero
[7] Only Table 9.1 Number of providers used for children aged 0 to 4 (by age of child), Table 9.2 Patterns of childcare use for children aged 0 to 4 (by age of child) and Table 10.2 Patterns of childcare use for children aged 5 to 14 (by age of child) have been retained this wave. Each of these tables have been renumbered and included in Chapter 1.
[8] Where a cell in a table contains only an asterisk, this denotes a percentage value of less than 0.5 but greater than zero. Asterisks are also shown immediately to the left of certain figures in tables that present the results of logistic regression models. In these cases, asterisks denote the level of significance of the odds ratios in the table as follows: *p<0.05, **p<0.01, ***p<0.001.