Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

When they want to oppose something, what do they default to? Good old union bashing is what we are seeing from the other side. It is extraordinary. They are straight into it. They talk about the national interest. The national interest is educating the future of this nation and caring for the welfare of the future of this nation which is children, and ensuring that they get a quality education. Members will be aware of my passion for education. In my first speech in parliament, I spoke about how I was proof of the transformative powers of education and it is a sentiment I have repeated again and again. Through education, I escaped the cycle of disadvantage. There are thousands and thousands more like me.

Often when I speak of education, I focus on primary schools, high schools or even universities. These are the years of education we remember, so they feel the most formative to us. However, countless studies, countless pieces of research and countless experts tell us that it is the early years of education that make the biggest difference—and the Jesuits tell us that as well. There is a compelling body of evidence showing that 90 per cent of a child's brain development happens in these critical early years. These are the formative years. These are the years we need to get right if we are to give our children all the opportunities they deserve.

I am very pleased, therefore, to be talking tonight about the Early Years Quality Fund Special Account Bill 2013, which seeks to improve quality outcomes for children in early childhood education and care services by enhancing the professionalism of the sector and improving the attraction and retention of a skilled and professional workforce. I am very proud of this Labor government's record of achievement in early childhood education and care. This government have been working hard to ensure that quality early childhood education and care remains affordable and accessible for all Australian families in the national interest.

We are investing a record $25 billion over the next four years in early childhood education and care, of which $22.1 billion will be in direct childcare assistance to parents. We have also delivered nearly $970 million between 2008 and 2013 to provide all Australian children in the year before they start primary school with access to a quality preschool education, delivered by a quality, qualified early childhood teacher.

These investments are already paying off. Recent data shows that because of this investment preschool enrolments have increased. In 2012, 266 four- and five-year-old children were enrolled in a program in the year before full-time school. This was 60,000 more children enrolled in 2012 than in 2008. So we have seen a dramatic increase in preschool enrolments.

In this year's budget, the government announced a further $666 million to extend the universal access commitment to quality early childhood education in the year before school to the end of 2014. The Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth has also announced that this year the early childhood education and care Closing the Gap target will be met—a significant development. In 2008, the Labor government pledged to deliver access to early childhood education to all Indigenous four-year-olds in remote communities within five years, and we have achieved that. These are significant achievements for this sector and I am particularly proud to be part of a government that has delivered them.

The bill we are debating tonight supports a very particular aspect of early years education—that is, supporting the employment retention and better pay of more highly qualified staff. Specifically, this bill establishes a special account to administer the Early Years Quality Fund. The fund will provide $300 million over two years to assist long day care services to offset the costs of employing higher qualified staff, who are required as part of the National Quality Framework for Early Childhood Education and Care from 1 January next year. Funding will be provided directly to eligible services to improve quality outcomes for children by supplementing wage increases of $3 per hour for cert III qualified educators. There will be proportionately higher wage increases for diploma and degree qualified educators.

Australian and international research shows that having educators with higher qualifications is closely associated with improved outcomes for children. More highly qualified staff have a better understanding of early childhood development and this results in better and more targeted education and care for our children to help them learn and develop.

Funding for wage increases will be assessed and approved based on a defined set of criteria and these are: a demonstrated commitment at the service to quality outcomes for children under the National Quality Framework, including a detailed plan to meet NQF qualification requirements; an agreement to use grant funds exclusively for wage increases, including detailed acquittal of funds to improve transparency; a commitment to affordability for families through fee restraint limited to actual operating cost increases, and no increases as a result of wages arising from the operation of the fund; increased fee transparency requirements for services, including explaining to parents the level of financial assistance provided by the government through childcare benefit and childcare rebates; meeting specific reporting requirements for the government's online childcare portal MyChild; and wage increases being included in an enterprise bargaining agreement.

In my electorate of Canberra I have visited many early childhood centres and met wonderful staff, gorgeous kids and wonderful parents. I know that the staff in these centres—who are mostly women because early childhood workers are still predominantly women—are incredibly committed to the children they care for. Earlier this year I spent one morning and one afternoon at a childcare centre at Isaacs in my electorate, walking in the shoes of a childcare worker as part of the Big Steps campaign. In the morning, I spent time with babies, changed nappies and cleaned lots of little bottoms, entertained these children, put them to bed, and through each half-day I spent a lot of time with kids in every age group. It was an absolutely delightful experience—but absolutely exhausting.

Looking after all these children on such a scale with all their different needs, and particularly with little ones going down at different times—so putting them down and getting the others up at the same time; taking them outside to play; keeping an eye on them and keeping them entertained, because at that stage you really do need to spend a lot of time entertaining them; as well as having them en masse trying to keep them all happy—it was exhausting on both of those half-days. I told the staff that I saluted them. I take my hat off to them for the work they do, caring for these children but also keeping them stimulated and educated.

I particularly admired the real rigour around the whole process for the day. If the children were playing with a toy, then the educator would observe what they were doing and repeat the experience of what they learned from playing with that toy. Or, if they were playing with other little children, then the educator would assess what the child was learning from that experience—the use of words, colours, sharing activity and team-building activity. There was not just a lot of play there but also a lot of education happening. There was a lot of assessment going on about the education of these children.

What particularly impressed me was that the educators could pick up on those kids who were quite often a bit shy—those who were not as socially advanced as the others in the same peer group or the same age group. They could pick up on that child and spend some time with them trying to encourage them to interact more closely with their peers or just spend some one-on-one time trying to draw out their strengths and the specific qualities of these children. So it was not just a case of an en masse approach to these small children. They were there as educators but they were also doing assessments throughout the time that I was with them, and throughout their day, on the advances that each child was making, and also attempting to fill those gaps, which I think was particularly important. Again, they were applying a rigour to it in doing an assessment in writing of that child. I understand that assessment goes into a system so that you can see the development of the child over the period of that child is in child care.

As I said, what would appear to be just playing with building blocks, looking at colours and reading books actually had this underpinning of learning and education throughout the day. I was incredibly impressed and absolutely exhausted after those two half-days.

This bill acknowledges the commitment of those workers by securing higher wages in recognition of their professionalism and qualifications. It is important to note that the establishment of this fund is intended only as a first step in a process that will, in time, see an overhaul of the remuneration of the entire early childhood workforce. This government has also announced the establishment of a pay equity unit in the Fair Work Commission. The primary role of the unit will be to assist the Fair Work Commission with data and research collection and specialist pay equity information. Of particular importance, it will assist in a long-term overhaul of pay equity in feminised workforces. The pay inequity at the moment not only causes day-to-day pay inequity but also means that women are going into superannuation with less money. They get less superannuation and so go into retirement with less money. I have said many a time in this House that I have had these women presenting at my electorate office every week.

It is also important to note that these wage increases are designed not to put upward pressure on fees. In fact, one of the conditions of receiving this funding is that there are no fee increases as a result of the wage increase that will occur from the fund. We know that parents and carers cannot afford to pay higher fees. That is why this government is taking action to increase wages while ensuring that fees do not increase. According to research by United Voice, childcare fees have risen on average by 11.2 per cent in the last 12 months—from $63.21 to $70.29 per day. Both the early childhood sector and families are under pressure in this regard and this bill has a requirement to contain childcare fee increases, meaning staff will get an increase in wages without fees going up.

This Early Years Quality Fund builds on steps this government has already taken to ensure we have a better qualified, better paid workforce in the early childhood sector. These initiatives include: the TAFE fee waiver that enables students to obtain a diploma or an advanced diploma in children's services without paying fees; the recognition of prior learning initiative, which provides grants of up to $3,500 to enable educators to have the skills they have acquired through working in the sector recognised and enables them to obtain or upgrade their qualifications; the HECS-HELP initiative, which provides funding to reduce the Higher Education Loans Program debts of early childhood education teachers who work in areas of high need such as remote areas of Australia; and the Inclusion and Professional Support Program, through which the educators and services receive professional development and support to enhance the provision of quality education and care services.

As I have mentioned, the early childhood workforce is a feminised workforce—it is predominantly women. As is too often the case in workforces dominated by women, early childcare workers are amongst the lowest paid skilled workers in this country. Workers have been fighting long and hard to receive professional wages in the early childhood sector. In particular, as I mentioned over the past year or so, the Big Steps campaign has united workers, parents, families and employers to support wage increases for early childhood educators. I have spoken to these parents in the afternoons. I have been there in these childhood centres talking to the staff and meeting the kids. I have spoken to the parents and they have all pushed for an increase in wages for the workers, the educators who are educating their children.

To the hundreds of people who contacted me in my electorate of Canberra, I say to them: firstly, thank you for sharing your concerns with me on this important issue and, secondly, we listened. This government is taking action. Higher wages are deserved by these skilled and qualified workers. Higher wages will help keep workers in the sector and higher wages will help attract more and better staff. As we know, we have a chronic lack of qualified staff in this sector at the moment, which is dramatically affecting childcare availability. This fund puts us on track to reform wages in this sector and it puts us on track well into the future. Qualified and skilled early childhood workers deserve this bill. Most importantly, our kids, our future and our nation deserve this bill. I commend it to the House.

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