Brown to boost childcare provision

A DRAMATIC ten-year plan to provide universal childcare is to be unveiled by Gordon Brown this month.

The Chancellor will use his Pre-Budget Report to commit the Government to 'high quality provision for the under-fives' for all parents who want it by 2015.

Brown's pledge will delight many in his own party, but may fuel claims Labour is ' nationalising the family'.

His report, due during the week ending November 20, will tackle critics who accuse him of burdening business with excessive controls and regulations.

He will also unveil an assault on pointless form-filling and other red tape in an effort to tear down the barriers that 'hold back the enterprising'.

And Brown is likely to accuse European governments of shutting British firms out of public procurement contracts on the Continent and of discriminating unfairly in favour of their own companies.