Ofsted deregisters 49 child care providers

Ofsted investigated 6250 complaints about providers of child
care in the last financial year. Just 49 registrations were
cancelled as a result of investigations.

Nearly half of complaints were made by parents or other service
users, but 10 per cent were made by staff working for the provider
and 14 per cent were made by other agencies such as social
services. Nearly one in five concerns were raised anonymously or by
members of the public, and only 7 per cent by Ofsted inspectors
themselves.

More than one in six of the investigations included a child
protection element and 601 of these were referred to social
services. Most were complaints about staff handling children
roughly, or smacking them.

During its second year as child care regulator, Ofsted
investigated 55 per cent of all complaints. Another 39 per cent
were investigated by the service provider who then reported back to
Ofsted. In other cases the complaint resulted in the date of a
scheduled inspection being brought forward.

Altogether 84,000 childminders and 34,000 providers of group
care were registered during the year. Of these, complaints were
received about 2500 childminders and 3,700 day care providers.

http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/publications/index.cfm?fuseaction=pubs.summary&id=3706