Whether or not the Labour party can win the argument on how best Britain can meet the growing challenge of providing high-quality care for both the youngest and oldest members of our society is a question only the party itself can answer. It is certainly in the interest of families that Labour tries hard to do so – the more hotly contested a political battleground the more likely we are to see the big, bold manifesto commitments we need in these areas. There is no doubt that there will be a political dividend for any party which is able to offer hard-pressed parents and carers a sense that the challenges they face are understood; that the contribution they are making to society is recognised; and that there is a sense of the fairness at the heart of the system.

Labour certainly has at least two reasons to approach the childcare challenge positively and with ambition. First, its track record in office from 1997 to 2010 is strong. The introduction of the free entitlement to 15 hours a week of childcare for every three- and four-year-old in the country represented a generational sea-change in investment in early years which, along with the investment in sure start, has begun to show dividends; with the attainment gap between the poorest children and their better-off peers closing year on year according to the Early Years Foundation Stage results. The childcare element of tax credits, along with employer-supported childcare vouchers, also provided much needed support for parents to meet childcare costs. But probably the most significant achievement, and one for which key Labour women like Harriet Harman were largely responsible, was putting childcare and early years on the political agenda and making it an issue that all future governments have to pay attention to.

Second, both childcare and social care are policy challenges that demand an active role for government. In the case of childcare, the market failure that exists particularly in deprived communities leads to those children that could benefit the most living in the areas with the fewest childcare places of the poorest quality. A 25-hour-a-week childcare place now costs more than £400 a month and is rising at more than five per cent a year. These costs are the reason cited by more than half of non-working mums for not going back to work after maternity leave. Without help to meet these costs from the state through tax credits and vouchers, the number of parents excluded from the labour market would rocket with acute social and economic impact.

So why is it so hard?  There is never an easy or low-cost answer when it comes to childcare and you get posed some really big questions along the way – do we want childcare or early education? Invest in supply or stoke up demand? Universal or targeted? The single biggest bit of advice I would give Ed Miliband, Stephen Twigg and Jon Cruddas as they wrestle with this one is keep it simple and listen to parents.

One of the big problems with the current system is that it is eye-wateringly complicated, with funding for different elements of childcare support coming from different government departments and being accessed by parents in different ways. This does nothing to help hard-pressed families trying to balance their budget and increases administrative costs. Talk to parents and many will tell you that they wish it was easier to work out what help they are entitled to and how much of the cost of childcare they will have to meet. But they will also tell you that, while affordability is a massive issue, availability and flexibility really matter too.

Our economy increasingly demands flexibility from employees but childcare provision has not adapted, and finding the right childcare place can still feel like looking for a needle in a haystack. Listen to a mum talk about the process of finding childcare for her return work from maternity leave, trying to work out if they can afford it, how they cope when their child is ill and can’t go to nursery, what happens when overtime is demanded at work or employers are inflexible. For many parents, particularly those not lucky enough to have a willing (and ideally retired) grandparent near by, this is a story of feeling insecure, unsupported and of muddling through.

Childcare is going to be a hot topic between now and the election and the party that can give these families a more positive vision of the future will reap the rewards.

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Claire McCarthy is director of public affairs at 4Children and is speaking at next week’s Winning With Women conference on Care crunch: Can Labour win the argument on childcare and social care? Sign up for your ticket here.