DfE Financial Incentive Pilot (FIP) Launched for Birmingham Early Years Workforce
DfE Financial Incentive Pilot (FIP)
Birmingham City Council has been selected to become one of 20 Local Authorities to offer a Financial Incentive Pilot (FIP) grant.
The purpose of this grant is to financially incentivise additional recruitment into the early years workforce by supporting the recruitment of an additional 654 staff based in Birmingham. The additional workforce capacity will support the successful delivery of the Early Years Childcare expansion reforms and build the capacity to include more children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND).
The FIP grant will provide new recruits with a £1000 “Golden Hello payment” after tax and national insurance. Providers will be able to apply for a grant payment to cover an incentive payment of £1000 and the additional tax and national insurance contributions. The incentive will be paid to new recruits following 12 weeks of employment.
The Birmingham FIP delivery plan targets two priority areas of recruitment needs:
Priority 1 - Wards that have been identified as having insufficient childcare places to meet the increased demand of the extended entitlements
Priority 2 – Increasing the number of skilled staff available in the workforce who can support children with SEND attending early years provision
Eligible Providers
Private Voluntary or Independent (PVI) early years providers registered to deliver Early Education Entitlement (EEE) places
Maintained Nursery Schools
Childminders registered to deliver EEE-funded places recruiting an assistant
NOTE: Providers must ensure that any job advertisements linked to incentives clearly state that there is a financial incentive attached to the role for anyone new to a permanent role in the early years sector or returning to the sector after 6 months.
Eligible Individuals
New to a career in early years
Returning to a career in early years (has not worked in a childcare provider for at least 6 months)
The position is permanent but it can be full or part-time
Be working directly with children for at least 70% of the time
Application Process
Providers are required to submit a grant application form to apply for the FIP funding.
The grant application form and the guidance document are available on EYMIS: Recruitment Financial Incentive Pilot - EYMIS Birmingham (ted-birmingham.org.uk)
Application deadline: 31 December 2024
User Name: PVI2
Password: PVI2year
You should enter your password as PVI in capital letters.
As the grant application form is used for all Birmingham City Council grant applications a large amount of information appears to be required. However, please refer to the guidance document as you will see that a lot of the information requested on the form is not required for the FIP grant.
Additional support with applications can be accessed by contacting the Early Years Duty Team, by email at EYDuty@birmingham.gov.uk or by phone at 0121 675 4996.
To access more recruitment and retention support and to advertise your vacancies please visit the Do Something Big website and Find a job - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
