What is Going Wrong with Childcare in Australia?

The ABC’s Four Corners programme Betrayal of Trust and subsequent reporting by the ABC has highlighted worrying issues relating to the health, safety and wellbeing of children in childcare (education and care services). However, unfortunately, this is nothing new. There have been consistent reports over the years (via tribunal/court cases or the media) of major safety issues in childcare including child abuse, children being left on transport buses, and children escaping from services unnoticed. In addition, in my previous posts, over the years, I have highlighted the concerning data published by the Productivity Commission (the annual Review of Government Services reports) and ACECQA. For example, ACECQA’s NQF Annual Performance Report 2024 shows that the rate of reported serious incidents per 100 services has steadily increased from 99 in 2016-17 to 148 in 2023-4; the proportion of services reporting one or more serious incidents has steadily increased from 43% in 2016-17 to 56% in 2023-4; and the rate of confirmed breaches per 100 services has doubled in the last four years: from 98 in 2016-17 to 201 in 2023-4. One would expect that in a mature regulatory system (the national regulatory scheme, the NQF, has been in place since January 2012) such figures would be decreasing.

However, that is not to say, as has been implied by some media reporting, that this issue has been completely ignored. At the request of the Commonwealth Minister for Education and Minister for Early Childhood Education, and supported by all state and territory Education Ministers, the Review of the Child Safety Arrangements under the NQF commenced in May 2023 “to identify new or refined systemic safeguards needed to support Approved Providers of education and care services to protect children, with a focus on reducing harm, abuse and neglect”. In December 2023 a final report was published by ACECQA with a number of recommendations: Review of Child Safety Arrangements under the National Quality Framework - Final Report – Findings and recommendations for the NQF and inter-related child safety mechanisms. Education Ministers were presented with the report and subsequently agreed in principle with the recommendations. Since early 2024 there does not appear to have been any further information published by them on implementation. However, the Queensland Regulatory Authority (Department of Education) recently published information on progress. In any event the report's recommendations, despite its terms of reference, were narrowly focussed; primarily on child abuse rather than the health, safety and wellbeing of children in general.

A good overview of the issue has been published in an article in The Conversation by Professors Marianne Fenech and Gabrielle Meagher. But how do we address the problem of child safety? A number of suggestions have been made ranging from establishing a Royal Commission to centralising the regulatory function. In my view these suggestions are either too simplistic or don’t get to the heart of what is a complex problem. In my next post I will suggest some possible solutions.