Martyn Oliver's speech at the Childcare and Education Expo
Source: gov.uk (2025-09-29)

Sir Martyn Oliver, Ofsted’s Chief Inspector, spoke at the 2025 Childcare and Education Expo in Coventry.

Introduction

Good afternoon everyone, and thank you for having Jayne and I here.

It’s a pleasure to be in Coventry with you all. You can just feel the energy. I’ve been here most of the morning: it’s such an inspirational and positive day and I’m really happy to be part of it.

In the spirit of the day, I want to start with a bold, positive statement I think we probably all believe to be true. One we’ve likely all heard before – but I really want to credit Jayne for saying this:

Every baby, every child deserves the very best start in life.

I know, it seems obvious.

It’s something all of us here feel deep in our bones and I imagine it’s been the undercurrent of pretty much every single conversation happening in the room today.

It’s a belief that holds firm, whether you’re looking after your own children or the children entrusted into your care.

The reason I begin with such an obvious statement and sentiment is because today I’m going to be talking about change.

Earlier this month, we published our response to the consultation (https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/improving-the-way-ofsted-inspects-education) about changes to education inspection. Our response, and the reforms that we’re introducing, together represent a huge change: one of the most significant developments in Ofsted’s long history.

And while it is a huge change, I’m really pleased to say it’s one that has been designed to fit with you and your day-to-day work. As you’ll hear, you now have a toolkit that’s been built to suit your needs. A toolkit that works for you and for parents. One that better supports you as you continue to do right by children every single day.

Because while our approach has changed, our determination to put babies and children at the heart of what we do hasn’t changed at all.

So, as we run through these reforms, that’s the one thing I want us all to hold in our heads. This core truth. This bone-deep belief that’s at the centre of this unique profession is that children deserve the best start in life.

A unique profession

Because childcare is a unique profession. Many of you here usually work alone or, if you’re in a nursery, you work in a small team. For some of you, when inspectors come in, they’re visiting your home! So, we’ve worked with important stakeholders and groups including Childminding UK and Coram PACEY, and I can see we have Neil from Early Years Alliance and Purnima from the National Day Nurseries Association here – we’ve worked with all of these groups to make sure the changes we’ve made will work for the different types of settings across early years education and care.

We want to help you feel confident, and informed, and able to take this back to your homes and nurseries and channel it into giving children the best start in life – as you already do, day in, and day out.

And I know this all-important work and change can be tough. Trust me, I know that brilliant people are leaving the profession: we’ve published the numbers. There are fewer childminders now than there were in March last year: a 5% drop: that’s 1,250 childminders no longer in the profession. The overall number of childcare settings has been dropping steadily since 2020 – there were 72,000 five years ago, and today that’s fallen to just over 60,000. Within that, the number of nurseries is going up.

But.

Parents still want the choice. Parents still want the unique provision offered by childminders. And parents also want to know that all types of settings are meeting the standards that they expect.

Because things do sometimes go wrong. Between September 2024 and March 2025, we inspected 5,660 early years settings. And while the vast, vast majority of those were places where children were thriving, 4% were found to be inadequate. That’s over 200 settings: 200 places around the country where children were not getting the quality of care that they have every right to receive – and that their parents have every right to expect.

That simply isn’t okay.

And again, I know it’s tough. We get so many questions about safeguarding issues, DBS requirements of any parents and partners in the home, and the real fear of getting it wrong.

So now is the moment. Now is the time to lean on this toolkit – and that’s why it’s called a toolkit – for the clarity and guidance that will truly support you to continue to do right by children.

I know many of you here play both roles: that of parent as well as that of a childcare professional. And the revised framework is here to support both roles and ensure that everyone is working to the same high standards that I am sure you all are working to in this room.

This isn’t about parents versus nurseries, or parents versus childminders. We know the best settings are places where parents come to pick up their children every day and get to build those positive interactions and those strong relationships with professionals. We want a system where we all collaborate to get the best outcomes for children at every age – because that’s who it’s really about.

I appreciate that in the past it’s not always felt like inspection frameworks spoke to you. For childminders in particular, we’ve heard that some of the standalone inspection areas really didn’t feel relevant to your work.

And across nurseries and the early years sector, we’ve heard concerns about workload, fairness, the grading scale, and the way we evaluate your work.

So thank you for telling us.

We have listened and, as you’re about to hear in more detail, we’ve acted on your feedback to create the renewed framework and toolkit specific to early years, built on the EYFS – that responds to those concerns and aims to do right by the children in your care.

A renewed approach

The renewed framework includes:

A new inspection report card, which gives more detail for childcare professionals like yourselves, and for parents. You’ll be able to get a sense of grades at a glance, with written narrative passages that dig deeper into the strengths and areas for improvement.

We will use a new 5-point grading scale to set high expectations, while encouraging improvement where it’s needed. In response to the feedback from professionals and parents, the set of grades are:

Urgent improvement

Needs attention

Expected standard

Strong standard

And to identify the very best practice in the country, we have changed the highest grade to Exceptional. The Exceptional grade will be a beacon that shines light on the best practice we find, so that others can learn from it.

There is a renewed focus on inclusion to help break down barriers to learning and well-being. Inspectors will evaluate whether settings are providing high-quality support to all children, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, those who have SEND, and those who are known to children’s social care.

We have a new early years inspection toolkit for grading settings. The toolkit shows the evaluation areas that we’ll focus on and how we’ll assess and grade providers. It’s really helpful to guide the conversations you have when inspectors visit. Jayne will tell you more about what this means for early years in a moment.

We are taking steps to reduce workload and we’re doing this by reflecting the requirements and expectations you will already be following. The early years toolkit is built on the EYFS framework. New operating guides set out the times inspectors can arrive and the suggested latest times they should leave, so inspection days don’t last longer than they need to.

A new online insights platform will also give parents important information about the childcare and education services in their local area.

Inspection findings will be grounded in a clear understanding of each setting’s unique circumstances. The new operating guide sets out how leaders and inspectors will reflect on a setting’s particular context and priorities.

In early years, we are the regulator, so we have tightened our ability to regulate. The renewed framework is more closely in line with the early years foundation stage statutory framework – so, to reach the expected standard, settings need to be meeting the requirements of registration and the EYFS.

If we give a setting the grade ‘urgent improvement’ for any area, we will normally re-inspect them within six months. For settings graded ‘needs attention’ in any evaluation area and where safeguarding standards are met, we will normally re-inspect within one year.

Inclusion at the heart

As I mentioned, at the heart of all this is putting babies and children first.

We want to break barriers down by raising standards up. And, as I’ve said many, many, many times in speeches like this one: getting it right for the most vulnerable means getting it right for everyone. I really do care about that, and I really do believe it.

At the heart of this framework, we’re emphasising how settings are addressing barriers to wellbeing and development.

That’s why we are introducing a separate ‘inclusion’ evaluation area.

And it’s also why it’s an important theme across other evaluation areas, too. Because inclusion isn’t just a nice add-on. It’s at the very heart of ensuring that every baby and child does get access to that best start in life.