Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to draw the House's attention to the struggle for families searching for child care for their young children. Every parent knows that the waiting lists are extremely long. Almost every working family has suffered the agonising wait to find a suitable childcare place for their infant in an environment where demand has rapidly outstripped supply.

Why do we find that childcare centres cannot keep up with demand? One reason is that many centres struggle to maintain the high number of qualified staff they need, because the pay for early childhood education remains inexcusably low. Talented, qualified educators simply cannot afford to remain in the profession they love so much on a low income. This means that fewer childcare workers are available. The Liberal Party broke their promise by denying early childhood educators the wage boost they were scheduled to receive last year. So we continue to lose qualified and well-trained staff and parents continue to struggle to find affordable child care for their children. Early childhood educators and children are extremely important to Australian families.

The Abbott government has a responsibility to properly fund early childhood educators and their care, so that our children get the possible head start while their parents return to work. It is not just paid parental leave; it is actually child care that is vitally important in this space. Not all families can rely on relatives for the care of their children. In my electorate, where 47 per cent of families are born overseas and do not have family members present, government investment in the wage of early childhood educators is crucial to ensuring that child care is affordable, flexible and available for the community. I want to congratulate Charlotte Schmid from Mount Waverley Secondary College, who completed this 90-second statement during work experience in my office last week. (Time expired)