Under the Equality Act 2010, childcare providers have a legal duty to ensure they support the access of all children to their provision. The Disability Access Fund (DAF) was introduced to help funded providers make those reasonable adjustments within their provision to support children with a disability, be that for the child in question or for the benefit of children attending the setting.

The Disability Access Fund is a one-off payment of £910 per child per year to the provider nominated by the parent and is to be used to support the inclusion of eligible children from the age of 9 months to 4 years old through reasonable adjustments. The payment is made regardless of how many hours a child attends and is not prorated. In Buckinghamshire payments are made in the term a child first becomes eligible and takes up an early education funded place and is then paid again on the first anniversary if the child is still in the setting. The payment will be made alongside the final claim payment for that term or in accordance with the information recorded on the schools census.

Providers will need to identify eligible children through conversations with parents and carers and record on the relevant Parent/Provider agreement form that they have seen evidence to show the child is in receipt of DLA. A copy of this evidence needs to be sent to the Early Years Funding Team via AnyComms. The DAF payment will not be made to a provider until the evidence has been seen by the Funding Team.

If a child attends more than one setting, funding is paid to the childcare provider nominated by the parent/carer on the relevant Parent/Provider Agreement form.

If a child eligible for DAF moves from one setting to another within a financial year, the new setting is not eligible to receive DAF funding for this child within the same financial year. DAF funding received by the original setting will not be recouped by the local authority.

Where a child lives in one authority area but attends a provider in a different local authority, the provider’s local authority is responsible for funding the DAF for the child and eligibility checking.

Please note: Four-year-olds in primary and infant school reception classes are NOT eligible for Disability Access Funding.

There is currently no specified guidance from the Department for Education (DfE) about the auditing of this funding. We would therefore advise providers to keep clear records and accounts of how they have used the funding, and where this benefits an individual child if applicable.

If you have any queries regarding payment of DAF funding please contact the Early Years Funding Team.

The Department for Education (DfE) has provided information about the Disability Access Funding