Anne Aly: Universal child care benefits both families and the economy

The early childhood education and care sector is an essential service that more than 1 million Australian families access each and every week.

But it isn’t working for every parent, every child or every community. That’s why the Albanese Labor Government embarked on a once in a generation reform for a universal early childhood education system in the great Labor traditions of universal Medicare and superannuation.

Our reform is focused on three pillars: making sure families can access an early childhood education place where they need it, ensuring we have enough workers, and keeping fees down for families.

We’ve already made significant progress. Since coming into office, there are now around 34,000 more workers in the sector. Our successful free TAFE program has increased the number of people choosing a career in early learning. And, about 200,000 early childhood workers are now eligible for a historic 15 per cent pay rise. Importantly, the wage rise is tied to a commitment from service providers to limit fee increases for families.

One of our first acts as a Government was delivering on our cheaper child care promise. Following our increase to the child care subsidy, average out-of-pocket costs decreased by 17 per cent for more than 1 million Australian families. Out-of-pocket expenses are lower than before the previous government introduced the subsidy in 2018.

But there is more to do.

This month the Prime Minister announced the next steps on our pathway to universal early childhood education and care. A re-elected Albanese Government will replace the activity test with a three day guarantee, ensuring that every child can access three days of subsidised early learning each week. This is important reform that will ensure children who would most benefit from early learning will be able to access it. Our three day guarantee will lower out-of-pocket-costs for almost 70,000 Australian families, with a further 100,000 families able to access more hours of subsidised early learning.

We’ll also deliver a $1 billion Building Early Education Fund to build more early learning centres, with a focus on areas where the market has failed – including regional and outer suburban areas. We’ll work with states to build centres on school sites and with local communities to build services where they are most needed. In rural and regional areas, this means doctors, nurses, teachers and other essential workers will be able to return to work.

A re-elected Albanese Government will also investigate a service delivery price, a data-driven understanding of the reasonable cost of providing early learning in different contexts, a crucial step as we continue to ensure early childhood education and care is affordable.

The Liberal Party has confirmed that they will go to the next election promising to cut funding to early childhood education and care — a move that would be disastrous for families and children.

The Liberal Party has criticised our plan to build more centres in the outer suburbs and regions.

And just last week, on the ABC Angus Taylor confirmed that they would not make any changes to the activity test, and argued that it’s “not something . . . the country can afford”.

What Australia can’t afford is Liberal cuts to early childhood education.

The Albanese Labor Government wants to create a future where every Australian child has the best possible start in life, and deliver a universal early learning system that works for every child, every family and every community.

Dr Anne Aly is the Minister for Early Childhood Education