Childcare free of charge Childcare center users surpass the expected due to a shortage of financial resources of about 50 billion yen

Childcare free of charge About 50 billion yen in funding shortage December 12th 16:02

It turned out that the expenses for free childhood education and childcare were expected to exceed the amount recorded in the budget this fiscal year by about 50 billion yen. The government has decided to add the shortfall to the supplementary budget plan for the current fiscal year due to the fact that there were more nursery school users than expected.

In conjunction with the increase in the consumption tax rate, the government has budgeted ¥ 38.2 billion for this year's expenses as a result of free childhood education and childcare that began in October.

According to the Cabinet Office, as a result of examining the usage situation as of October 1 through the local government, the number of authorized nursery school users was higher than originally assumed, and the amount of childcare fee set according to income There were many relatively high users.

For this reason, this fiscal year, the necessary expenses were finally 437.5 billion yen, and the budget was expected to be 49.3 billion yen shortage.

The breakdown of the shortfall is 30.2 billion for privately licensed nurseries and some kindergartens and 19.1 billion for public nurseries run by local governments.

The government has decided to add the missing expenses to the supplementary budget proposal for this year.

According to the Cabinet Office, based on this survey, the expenses for the next fiscal year are expected to exceed the initial assumption of 770 billion yen and exceed 800 billion yen.

Local governments will be responsible for a part of the expenses for free of charge from the next fiscal year.