text: David Cameron will today promise extra free childcare for 600,000 children a year to counter spiralling costs. In a speech on the economy, the Prime Minister will say the expense of nurseries and childminders has become a major barrier to employment. The Conservatives have pledged to reduce tax relief on pension contributions for people earning more than £150,000 to fund additional free childcare places. Scroll down for video . David Cameron, pictured, will today announce an extra 600,000 childcare spaces at a cost of £350 million . Mr Cameron, pictured, will tell the audience that the Conservative Party wants to reward hard work . ‘For many second earners, work didn’t pay because the cost of childcare was so high. So we introduced 15 hours of free childcare a week for three- and four-year-olds and disadvantaged two-year-olds. ‘In the next Parliament we will double that for three- and four-year-olds. That’ s right – 30 hours of free childcare a week – worth £5,000 to working families. ‘That means over 600,000 extra free childcare places available for families every year – nine million extra hours of childcare a week and parents able to work an extra 78 days a year without any childcare costs – all by 2017.’ Mr Cameron will also argue ‘that true compassion isn’t giving people a benefits cheque – it’s giving them a chance’. The Conservatives inherited a ‘shocking situation’ where ‘some of the poorest people faced some of the highest marginal rates of taxation’ and couples ‘were spending as much on childcare as one of them took home in earnings’. ‘We, the Conservative Party, have been using all the tools at our disposal – the tax and benefit system; childcare and the minimum wage, to turn that around. This goes to the heart of the country we are trying to build: one based on the principle of something for something, not something for nothing – where those who put in, get out, where hard work is rewarded – where we make work pay. ‘I’ve said it before: I’m not in this job to be some high powered accountant. I don’t just want the lines on the graph to go in the right direction. I want lives to go in the right direction. I believe passionately in reducing poverty. And the best route out of poverty is this: work. ‘We’ve proved that. Since we came to power – since we’ve got more people working than in our history – there are 600,000 fewer people and 300,000 fewer children in relative poverty.’ The new free childcare will be available where all parents in the household are working at least eight hours a week at the minimum wage. The new 30 hours entitlement will cost just under £350 million a year.
target: David Cameron will announce the new £350 million childcare places today .
  He will cut tax relief on pension contributions for those on more than £150k .
  Mr Cameron will tell his audience he wants to 'make hard work pay'
  He will say that work rather than benefits is the best way to avoid poverty .