Sue Boyce (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

A crop of children—yes, why not? But those children would be coming in; we would have those places, and more, filled. But what parent in their right mind right now is booking their child into an ABC Learning centre if they have a skerrick of an alternative? Because you do not know whether, come February next year, April next year or some other time, that childcare place is going to be there. You do not know how much time you or your partner might have to take off work because the childcare place has simply disappeared.

So what is happening is that these parents are looking for other sources of child care. Most of them are searching desperately now for something that at least they can guarantee will be there when they need it in February next year. So what we do absolutely need is some decisive action from this government, and that is not expressions of interest or a plan that we are going to hear about two weeks before Christmas. It is now that we need the urgency summit organised, so that there is a long-term solution, because 400 unprofitable centres are going to look like child’s play as parents vote with their feet on what they think about the decisiveness of this government and enrol their children as far as possible anywhere else. If you are trying to run a business, as every ABC Learning centre is, it is unreasonable not to have any idea of what your market for next year is going to be, less than three months out, because the government cannot quite manage to organise themselves a meeting to discuss this issue properly.