£21bn plan for teaching infants 'has not worked'

A large-scale study found that the £21 billion spent by the Government over the past decade on a raft of schemes to educate children from the earliest age has so far had no effect.

The findings are the latest blow to Labour's expensive childcare campaigns.

They add to growing evidence of the disastrous failure of Sure Start, the Government's flagship programme for helping children from poor families.

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Sure Start alone has swallowed up £10 billion of taxpayers' money, despite an officially sponsored inquiry finding that it has done more harm than good.

It also follows research suggesting that the massive increase in Government funding for daycare provision over the past decade, aimed at helping children to progress more quickly, has in fact hindered their intellectual development as well as exacerbating their behaviour problems.

Undeterred by such failures, ministers are trying to produce a national curriculum for babies that will set targets for infants to reach before they are a year old.

They are also introducing a "parenting workforce" to assist parents who, for example, do not sing nursery rhymes to their offspring.

For the latest research, academics at Durham University monitored nearly 35,000 children over a six-year period.

They looked for evidence of improved development in pupils entering primary schools between 2001 and 2006.

However, the results suggested that skills and cognitive development were no different from levels before the spending on early-years education began to take effect.

Dr Christine Merrell, of the university's Curriculum, Evaluation and Management Centre, said:

"Our aim with this study is to provide a single perspective on the changing profiles of children starting school in England during a time of rapid change. One would have expected that the major Government programmes would have resulted in some measurable changes in our sample of almost 35,000 children."

However, she said more research is needed. "It is possible that it is just still too early to measure the effects of these programmes."

More than 18 months ago, the Government published initial research into the impact of Sure Start.

This found that the programme was not reaching the children it was aimed at and was likely to be making their plight worse.

The report said that by allocating funds to those who did not need it, they were in fact widening the gap between the poorest children and those just above them.

That research also warned that it might be too early to make a full assessment, but further analysis of Sure Start's performance is yet to be published.

Alongside Sure Start, the Government has also introduced free nursery education for all year- olds and an early years curriculum.

This requires children to smile at toys at 11 months, respond to words by 20 months, recite numbers by 36 months, and sing familiar songs by the age of four.

Critics accused ministers of letting children down with gimmicky initiatives.

Jill Kirby, of the centre-Right think-tank the Centre for Policy Studies, said: "This Government has poured money into pre-school education and childcare. We can now see the money has been largely wasted. We have been told this is important to ensure children are more ready to enter school.

"This research shows that has not happened, and that daycare for children has no educational value."

But Children's Minister Beverley Hughes insisted Government initiatives on early development are effective, adding: "As the author of this report acknowledges, it is still too early to measure this with any great authority."