MORE men have been urged to work in nurseries to help address a chronic shortfall in the number of childcare staff across Scotland.

An extra 18,000 new workers will be required by 2020 to meet a Scottish Government commitment to expand free childcare places, but not enough new members of staff are being trained to fill the vacancies.

Currently some 95 per cent of all students who train in childcare services at Scottish colleges are female.

A £50,000 fund has now been announced to help boost the number of men.

The fund will be split between two colleges to run pilot projects which support men into childcare professions.

Maree Todd, the Children and Young People Minister, announced the fund while meeting male workers at the Highland Fling Nursery in Edinburgh.

She said: “This is a fantastic opportunity for colleges to test out new ways of getting men into the workforce, supporting our work to diversify the sector and recruit more people than ever to deliver quality early learning.

“Increasing the number of men in childcare means children will benefit from different perspectives and have more male role models to look up to.”

Paul Archibald, the general manager of the Highland Fling Nursery, said perceptions of the importance of childcare to society were changing which helped when trying to address the gender balance.

He graduated as a PE teacher in America, but because his qualifications were not transferable, he looked for a different career path and settled on the childcare sector.

He said: “There is a stigma about men doing the job, particularly when I was single, but now I am married with children I am seen as safer in people’s eyes.

“I think it is becoming more the norm to have men in childcare and it can make parents more comfortable knowing a nursery has a diverse group of staff with both women and men.”

Jane Malcolm, Scottish policy manager for the National Day Nurseries Association, said most parents were now positive about men and women workers.

She said: “They may have some initial reservations, but parents want their child’s experience to reflect the world we live in and not to instil them with an idea that some roles are only for women to do.”

John Kemp, the SFC’s interim chief executive, said caring should not be viewed as an exclusively female role.

He said: “Scotland’s colleges are uniquely positioned to have a positive impact on redressing the current gender imbalance in this workforce.”