middle of the night bored theory - what are the holes:

At the mo my other half would love to work but we have a 2 year old. Nursery is £60 a day and that doesnt include when you're late etc. So basically she has to earn 20k to break even let alone adding in commuting etc. Just doesnt seem worth it so she doesnt. So no tax coming in and she doesnt progress.

How about any working other half who's kid is of nursery age gets free nursery if they pay tax.

So before they were not paying tax so treasury had nothing but treasury didnt pay for nursery.

Now treasury has to pay nursery but they get tax. This may be basic tax but at last has the potential to be more as the person is back in the working system.

Holes? If on min wage there wont be much tax but this may be balanced by people who ending up progressing where before they would not.

tear it apart..

Just go on benefits. There was a woman (single mother of seven) on TV the other night giving an interview from her free six bedroom house. She was complaining her money was being reduced from £2600/month to £2100/month and 'how would she cope'.

I have to admit, I got just a tad angry.

So your wife will contribute less than £4k for what will be about £15k of nursery costs. Doesn't seem like a great deal to me.

It'll distort the nursery fees market (as government intervention does) as the benefit will have to cap the fees payable and all nurseries will simply raise their fees to the cap.

Because you have a expensively educated member of society who is going to sit at home for the next 4-5 years (more if you have several kids) not contributing back into the system.

If you cut some sort of deal on child care you get that productive member of society back to contributing.

hmm this is the most sensible answer.

and yes i suppose the figures dont work out in that it would cost £15k a year in nursery fees and you need to be earning a fair bit to get that.

maybe pay for a few more days like they so when they are 3 so the figures equate a bit better?

im not saying i want tax payers to fund my kid for free im trying to find a situation where a parent ends up giving back more in tax as they are able to go back to work.

Just sack the public sector, cut tax to 2p in the pound, job done.

You had a child, before said child you should of weighed up everything. It's not the tax payers fault that kids are expensive investments in the human race.

Is there anything legally to stop 5 mums getting together and taking it in turns to look after each other's kids 1 day a week so that they can work the other 4?

The nursery education grant is already in place as a universal benefit and goes some way to providing the sort of incentive that you suggest.

Its a pretty good idea actually; my only criticism is that its 'universal'. In my view it should be means tested in order to get more children who wouldnt otherwise access it into early years education, rather than frittering it away on parents who can and will pay for pre-school education anyway.