Catryna Bilyk (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

When Labor was in government, we established the National Partnership Agreement on Universal Access to Early Childhood Education. This was an extraordinarily successful program which funded 15 hours a week of kindergarten or preschool across Australia. The program lifted preschool enrolment from 77 per cent in 2008 to 93 per cent today. Should we be elected to government this year, we will go even further with a National Preschool and Kindy Program, which will provide an additional year of kindergarten or preschool. That's a minimum of 15 hours per week of early learning over two years before compulsory schooling starts. This $175 billion program would be the largest investment in early childhood education in Australia and, with our policy, 700,000 three- and four-year-olds would have access to kindy and preschool.

When I talk about an additional year of early childhood education, it's important to distinguish what federal Labor is offering compared to the Hodgman Tasmanian government's dumped proposal to reduce the school starting age. I've spoken against that proposal in this place before and I will continue to oppose it for the reasons I outlined then. There is a big difference between funding an additional year of early learning and reducing the school starting age. The latter proposal would see children advancing to later years of school before they are ready, and that could be quite harmful.

I've spoken in this place before about the enormous benefits of access to early learning, and I know this not just from the research evidence in Australia and overseas but from my own personal experience of some 12 years as an early childhood educator. Some of the many benefits include improved social skills; better performance in later school years, including in reading, numeracy and non-verbal reasoning; increased attention span, greater independence, a reduction in antisocial behaviours, and the list goes on. A University of Melbourne study in 2013 found that children who attended a quality early-learning program in the year before school were up to 40 per cent ahead of their peers by the time they reached grade 3. An investment in early learning is an investment not just in our children but in the future prosperity of our country. Recent research found that for every dollar invested in early learning we reap at least $2.60 in benefit. While this investment would lift the educational achievement of all children, it particularly benefits children from vulnerable and disadvantaged backgrounds. The benefits aren't just for the children; they also help parents to juggle work and family responsibilities.

Federal Labor's commitment stands in stark contrast to those opposite, who, in the last budget, cut $440 million of funding to the national partnership agreement. Those opposite cut a further $20 million from the National Quality Agenda, a program which provided support to the states and territories to ensure quality and standards in early childhood education and care. They've also implemented a new childcare subsidy which leaves one in four families worse off and creates confusion and complexity for many families trying to understand and use the system. Quite simply the Liberals' record on investing in early learning has been abysmal. We heard the Minister for Education, Mr Tehan, claim he was working on securing funding for the national partnership agreement well beyond 2020, yet we have no indication the government has even commenced negotiations with the states and territories on a new partnership agreement. The government had a chance to reverse this cruel cut in MYEFO but failed to do so.

While I welcome the fact that the national partnership agreement funding has finally been restored in tonight's budget, it was cruel and short-sighted not to do so earlier. This government had plenty of opportunity to restore kindy and preschool funding yet chose to leave 350,000 children and their families in the lurch for the past 11 months. It goes to show that those opposite have reversed this cut only because they've been shamed into doing so, not because they believe in the value of early learning. The government's record on the national partnership agreement speaks volumes about its lack of commitment to early learning. Australians need a government which understands and appreciates the value of early learning not only for Australia's economy but also for the enormous benefits it brings to the social, intellectual and emotional development of Australia's children—and that, of course, would be a Shorten Labor government.