Parents cautiously welcome changes to childcare checks
Allanah Sciberras |
Parents and unions have cautiously welcomed an overhaul of working-with-children checks but say more reforms are needed to keep kids safe.
Fast-tracked reforms unveiled on Friday will ensure that by the end of the year, anyone prevented from holding a working-with-children check in one state or territory will be automatically banned across the country.
Attorney-General Michelle Rowland described the change as “long overdue” but confirmed a national working-with-children check was not on the cards, with jurisdictions to continue managing their systems.
Australia’s peak early learning body said aligning the working-with-children checks nationwide would help protect children in care.
“This is an important first step (to) closing the loopholes that currently exist,” Australian Childcare Alliance president Paul Mondo said.
“This step alone, however, requires further commitments including the development of a national register for early childhood educators and teachers.”
National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds described the changes as a huge relief, saying they would “absolutely make a difference to the safety of children”.
“This is just the first step of a whole range of actions that need to be taken,” she told ABC TV on Friday.
The changes come almost a month after Melbourne worker Joshua Dale Brown was charged with dozens of sex offences, including allegedly sexually abusing eight children.
Brown is known to have worked at 24 facilities between 2017 and the time of his arrest.
Melody Glaister’s daughter was one of 1200 children who had to be tested for sexually transmitted infections in July after attending a childcare centre where Brown had worked.
She was shocked to discover mutual recognition of decisions on working-with-children checks was not already in place.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” Ms Glaister told AAP.
“The childcare sector is a mess and it does need reform and massive changes.
“We can’t trust that the system is safe for our children.”
Education Minister Jason Clare on Friday announced compliance action had been initiated against 30 early childhood centres under laws passed by the federal parliament in July.
Under the changes, funding will be stripped from centres not meeting safety standards.
The nation’s education ministers will meet next week to consider further child safety laws.
Jen Fleming, co-founder of advocacy group For Parents, said parents needed a seat at the reform table.
“Parents walk into childcare centres every day in this country and they leave their most precious people with childcare workers,” Ms Fleming told AAP.
“We as parents are quite rightly questioning what is going wrong in the system … they haven’t consulted with parents.”
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AAP
