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The Comprehensive Spending Review is on the table and local authorities are considering what services they will have to cut.

We have to ‘tighten our belts’ we must be prepared for ‘changes’, the ‘Big Squeeze’ is on. If the details are not clear yet, we should be in no doubt about what to expect from Whitehall in the Spending Review on 20 October.

We are all going through a period of transition - a new Government, changes to the funding mechanisms for early years, a spending review.

Support for training and professional development among the workforce has made a huge difference to the way nurseries operate and the quality they deliver. This must continue under a new Government, says Karen Walker, director of Children's Place nursery chain.

The bank holiday season is almost over, the royal wedding has come and gone and we return to find the funding for early years is still stretched beyond belief.

Dame Clare Tickell's review of the Early Years Foundation Stage recommends that the EYFS be reduced from 69 to 17 measures.

The fact that the EYSFF has stalled is disappointing for nurseries who worked closely with their local authorities to prepare for it. Karen Walker, director of the Children's Place nursery chain, admits to being disillusioned.

The axes are beginning to fall and slowly the extent of the cuts to services for children are being made known across the country. We are finally beginning to get a sense of what importance this Government places on early years, and perhaps we are beginning to realise the extent of our own foolishness in not being better prepared to strengthen the argument for high quality early years care and education.

I am really pleased that 2011 has been designated ‘the year of communication’.

As I type this I am looking out at a snowy scene in the centre of London. It's not what I anticipated when leaving the ‘frozen north’ a few months ago to join the team at London Early Years Foundation. I trust that we are all trying to keep warm and support the children in having fun.

Failure on the part of the Government to recognise the importance of the early years will spell very bad news for the sector.

Social networking sites are increasingly posing challenges to nurseries’ professional practice.

With 2011 underway, VAT has increased, petrol costs have increased, house prices are going down, cost of living is going up.