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‘I left Wales and moved to England for free childcare’
Bethan LewisEducation & family correspondent, BBC Wales News
Robin LloydFrom her Monmouthshire home, Robin Lloyd was able to see houses over the border in England knowing the families who lived there could access free childcare for their babies.
Robin and her husband decided to leave Chepstow and Wales and moved a 30-minute drive away to Gloucestershire so they would be eligible for support for children from nine months old.
In Wales, free childcare for two-year-olds is being expanded, prioritising disadvantaged areas but there is no support for younger children.
The Welsh government said its childcare programmes were “sustainable” and prioritising “more disadvantaged communities”.
Robin, a 35-year-old nurse, started thinking about childcare during her pregnancy.
“I realised that I would be paying almost double my mortgage each month in childcare in Wales but I could see England out of my window and the people in the houses over there would be having financial support,” she said.
“I knew I wanted more than one child but the cost of childcare was going to mean that it wasn’t going to be possible until my son was pretty much four years old.
“We were very cautious about the whole process but eventually decided that the way to afford a family of two children was to move to England.”
The move to the Forest of Dean cost £15,000 in solicitors’ fees and stamp duty “but overall was going to be a heck of a lot cheaper than trying to pay childcare in Wales”.
‘Really sad about it’
Since 1 September, working parents in England have been offered 30 hours of childcare a week during term time for children aged nine months to four years old.
There have been concerns about the availability of places and the cost of extra, unfunded hours.
But Robin said she had been able to get two days of funded childcare a week for her one-year-old, while she and her husband work part-time.
“That makes it far more affordable for somebody like me who’s just a nurse,” she said.
“I don’t have megabucks to be able to afford a home for my family and to have childcare.
“I’m really sad about it. I’ve left my home. But ultimately, if it means I can have the family, it’s worth it.”
In Wales, there is currently no childcare funding for children under two.
However the Welsh government is rolling out 12.5 hours of free care a week for all two to three-year-olds under the Flying Start scheme.
It said it had reached 15,901children through the scheme by the end of 2024-25 – roughly 52% of two-year-olds in Wales.
The next phase of expansion in 2025-26, funded by an extra £25m, is expected to “reach more than 4,000 additional children”, it said.
The Flying Start scheme is being extended by postcode, focusing on the most deprived areas first.
Merthyr Tydfil has become the first county in Wales to offer a place to all two-year-olds under the programme.
It covered a place every afternoon at Little Rascals nursery in Merthyr for Grace’s daughter, which she describes as “invaluable”.
She thinks it is important that all parents of young children, not just those who are working, are eligible for the support, meaning there is a “level playing field”.
‘Swathes don’t benefit’
“It’s so beneficial to have this programme for Merthyr, for everyone living here to have the opportunity for their children to go into childcare at such a young age without any stress about fees,” she said.
On the same site, Ana’s son goes to the forest school, where the children spend most of the day learning outside.
Their postcode was the last in Merthyr to become eligible for Flying Start childcare support in April.
“It’s such a shame that there are swathes of our country that don’t benefit from that,” she said.
“You just have to set foot inside one of these nurseries to find out how children love being around each other and learning from each other.”
In Merthyr, council bosses said “100% of early years providers” were able to offer Flying Start places, with capacity for all two-year-olds in county.
“This has been achieved over a considerable period of time, ensuring that we’ve got enough childcare places and that’s really important in all of this – making sure that whatever we commit to we’ve got enough childcare places,” said Sarah Ostler, the early years and Flying Start manager for Merthyr Tydfil council.
She said they had used Welsh government funding to extend the provision and had made sure there was “a suitably-qualified and experienced workforce”.
But in Monmouthshire, a councillor said parents were acutely aware of the different offer over the border in England.
Conservative county councillor Lisa Dymock said a number of people had moved to the area from Bristol with many under the impression they would be offered the same childcare offer as in England.
“Whilst they may have settled and live in a lovely location like south-east Monmouthshire, they’ve now realised [they’re] not entitled to this free childcare and they’re having to re-examine their budgets and their outgoings, which is hard for a young family,” she said.
‘Making a real difference’
Ms Dymock said that while Flying Start was “a very good scheme” it did not help women who needed to return to work and she wanted the English offer matched in Wales.
“I think that will help the household income, residents’ careers but also children’s development,” she said.
“I just think it’s a huge benefit and it’s what my residents are asking for – it’s what people want.”
The Welsh government said its childcare programmes were “making a real difference for families across Wales”.
It said the flying Start programme was now being extended two all two-year-olds.
“We’ve prioritised our more disadvantaged communities and made sure provision is sustainable”, a spokesperson said.
They said the Childcare Offer for Wales, providing up to 30 hours per week of care for three and four-year-olds, was more generous than England’s scheme.
“Unlike in England, it is available to parents in training and education as well as those in work and is available 48 weeks per year, compared to England’s 38 weeks.”
What are the political parties’ childcare promises?
In its autumn conference, Plaid Cymru announced it would offer at least 20 hours’ free childcare for 48 weeks a year to all children nine months to four years old by 2031.
The current offer of 30 hours for some three and four-year-olds would continue.
The Welsh Liberal Democrats said it would introduce 30 hours per week of childcare for children from nine months to school age and invest in school holiday provision.
The Welsh Conservatives said it would replicate the childcare offer in England of 30 hours a week for working parents of nine month to four-years-olds during term time.
It said there would be more details in its manifesto for the Senedd election.
Welsh Labour said it was “proud” to roll out free childcare for two-year-olds, providing a tax break for nurseries and expanding subsidised childcare for three and four-year-olds.
It is still discussing the offer for 2026 and beyond, the party said.
Reform UK said it was putting together a manifesto to “deliver the real change Wales needs”.
Buying property from an NRI? Worried about obtaining TAN? Not anymore. To relax the compliance burden, the Budget has proposed that resident individuals and HUFs need not have a Tax Deduction and Collection Account Number (TAN) if they are purchasing a property from a non-resident Indian (NRI). The amendment will take effect from Oct 1, 2026.Under the proposed framework, resident individuals or HUFs can report the tax deducted at source (TDS) by quoting PAN, as is done when the transactions are between two residents. Presently, if a person buys an immovable property from a resident seller, the person is not required to obtain TAN to deduct tax at source. However, where the seller of the immovable property is a non-resident, the buyer is required to obtain TAN to deduct tax at source.Ameet Patel, partner at Manohar Chowdhry & Associates, said this used to be a detailed process. “At present, if a resident were to purchase an immovable property from an NRI, there is no separate relaxation regarding compliance with TDS responsibilities. As a result, in such cases, the buyer needs to obtain a TAN, register on the portal, and then deduct TDS u/s. 195, and pay to the govt. Under section 195, as with all other regular TDS sections, a quarterly e-TDS statement is required. A buyer would need professional help for all this.”Hinesh Doshi, CA, welcomed the move. “There used to be an unnecessary compliance burden due to this. While the process to obtain TAN is simple, people used to obtain TAN for just one transaction. So, this is a good riddance.”
The former One Direction member-turned-solo artist appears on the Sunday Times list for the first time.
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Budget 2026: FM Nirmala Sitharaman gives a strong push to manufacturing, infrastructure and job creation, while proposing a simpler tax and customs system.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presents the Union Budget 2026-27.
Budget 2026 Takeaways: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday presented the Union Budget 2026-27, giving a strong push to manufacturing, infrastructure and job creation, proposing a simpler tax and customs regime, and hailing the government’s modernisation drive as a “reforms express”.
The Budget 2026 is anchored around three ‘kartavyas’ — driving growth by enhancing productivity and competitiveness, building people’s capacity, and ensuring inclusive development under the vision of Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikaas.
In her ninth consecutive Budget in Parliament, Sitharaman laid out a multi-pronged strategy to sustain growth amid global uncertainty, including expanding domestic electronics and semiconductor capabilities, de-risking infrastructure projects, skilling India’s youth for emerging technologies, and easing compliance for taxpayers and importers.
Here are the key takeaways from Budget 2026 across manufacturing, infrastructure, skills, AI, taxation and customs duty.
Manufacturing Gets A Boost
Budget 2026 put a special emphasis on the manufacturing landscape in India. The outlay for electronics components manufacturing was raised sharply to Rs 40,000 crore, while new schemes for rare earth magnets, chemical parks, container manufacturing and capital goods seek to reduce import dependency, and strengthen domestic supply chains. Textiles got an integrated, employment-oriented package covering fibres, clusters, skilling and sustainability.
Infrastructure-Led Growth
Infrastructure got a boost with a higher capex allocation and initiatives like a risk guarantee fund to de-risk projects for private developers, new dedicated freight corridors and national waterways, dedicated REITs (real estate investment trusts) for recycling of significant real estate assets of central public sector enterprises (CPSEs), and a seaplane VGF (viability gap funding) scheme.
The Centre’s capital expenditure (capex) target has been increased to Rs 12.2 lakh crore for FY27, up from Rs 11.2 lakh crore earmarked for the current financial year. Moreover, maintaining the fiscal discipline, Sitharaman said the government expects the fiscal deficit to be at 4.3 per cent of the GDP in 2026-27, lower than 4.4 per cent projected for the current financial year.
Tier-II and Tier-III cities were placed at the centre of urban growth via City Economic Regions, backed by reform-linked funding.
“We shall continue to focus on developing infrastructure in cities with over 5 lakh population (Tier II and Tier III), which have expanded to become growth centres,” Sitharaman said in her Budget Speech.
Greater Emphasis On Skilling
The Budget placed renewed emphasis on the services economy as a jobs engine. A high-powered Education-to-Employment and Enterprise Committee will realign skilling with market needs, including the impact of emerging technologies.
Content creation and creative industries get a boost through AVGC labs in schools and colleges, support for animation, gaming and comics, and new institutional capacity for design and hospitality. Tourism-linked skilling, from guides to digital heritage documentation, signals a clear intent to convert culture and content into employment and exports.
“I propose to support the Indian Institute of Creative Technologies, Mumbai in setting up AVGC Content Creator Labs in 15,000 secondary schools and 500 colleges,” FM Sitharaman said. AVGC stands for animation, visual effects, gaming and comics.
AI & Semiconductors Push
Artificial intelligence (AI) was positioned as a cross-sector force multiplier rather than a standalone theme. The Budget provided a push to artificial intelligence (AI) by promoting adoption with governance, agriculture, education and skilling, including proposals for AI-enabled advisory tools for farmers and AI integration in education curricula.
On hardware, the semiconductor strategy expanded decisively under ISM 2.0 (India Semiconductor Mission 2.0), with focus on domestic equipment manufacturing, materials, research centres and workforce development, signalling a long-term commitment to building a resilient chip ecosystem in India.
Taxation, ITR, TDS, TCS
A major structural reform comes with the Income Tax Act, 2025, effective April 1, 2026, containing simpler rules and redesigned forms.
Budget 2026 provided compliance relief for individuals, including extended timelines for revising returns to March 31 from December 31 earlier, staggered ITR due dates, and easier filing of Form 15G/15H through depositories.
Individuals with ITR-1 and ITR-2 returns will continue to file till July 31, and non-audit business cases or trusts are proposed to be allowed time till August 31, according to the Budget Speech 2026-27.
“I propose to extend time available for revising returns from 31st December to up to 31st March with the payment of a nominal fee. I also propose to stagger the timeline for filing of tax returns. Individuals with ITR 1 and ITR 2 returns will continue to file till 31st July and non-audit business cases or trusts are proposed to be allowed time till 31st August,” Sitharaman said.
TDS (Tax deducted at source) rules were clarified for manpower services, while a rule-based system for lower or nil TDS certificates is proposed. TCS rates were cut to 2% for overseas tour packages, education and medical expenses under liberalised remittance scheme (LRS). Litigation is targeted through integrated assessment and penalty orders, lower pre-deposit requirements, and wider immunity provisions.
TDS on the sale of immovable property by a non-resident will be deducted and deposited through resident buyer’s PAN (Permanent Account Number)-based challan instead of requiring TAN (Tax Deduction and Collection Account Number), Sitharaman said.
Customs Duty Tweaks
Customs duty rationalisation continued with a clear focus on domestic manufacturing, energy transition and ease of living. Exemptions have been extended or introduced for capital goods used in lithium-ion batteries, critical minerals processing, nuclear power projects and aircraft manufacturing.
Personal imports will become cheaper with a reduction in duty on goods for personal use from 20% to 10%. Seventeen cancer drugs and additional rare-disease treatments were exempted from customs duty. Process reforms aimed at trust-based, tech-driven clearances, faster cargo movement and lower compliance costs, especially for exporters and MSMEs (micro, small, medium and enterprises).
STT On F&O Hiked
The Budget increased securities transaction tax (STT) on futures trading from 0.02% to 0.05% and on options trading from 0.10% to 0.15%, a move that upset the capital markets with the BSE Sensex crashing more than 2,300 points from the day’s high and the NSE Nifty dropping to 24,571.75.
Securities Transaction Tax (STT) is a direct tax imposed on the buying and selling of securities in India.
Commenting on the Budget, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “The Union Budget reflects the aspirations of 140 crore Indians. It strengthens the reform journey and charts a clear roadmap for Viksit Bharat.”
February 01, 2026, 14:43 IST
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