Australia’s childcare system was broken before ABC Learning Centres and CFK Childcare hit their recent well-publicised financial problems.
Demand for formal care is growing fast. According to the ABS which re-issued its 2005 child care data yesterday:
Over the three year period from June 2002 to June 2005, the numbers of children aged 0-11 years who attended before and/or after school care increased from 171,000 to 227,000, an increase of 56,000 or 33%.
The ABS child care figures also suggest that supply (before ABC and CFK problems) was falling short of demand:
According to parents’ responses, there was a requirement for additional formal care for 188,400 children (6% of children aged 0-12 years). Of these, only 33% said that they did not use additional care because child care providers were booked out or had no places. A further 10% said that no services existed or they did not know of any services in the area, and another 9% said they did not know whether care was available. For 30,700 children (16% of those for whom additional formal care was required), parents reported that they did not use additional care because of the cost of care. The cost of care was also the reason given for 99,000 children for whom parents reported that they did not require additional formal care. Other service-related reasons were given as the reason for not requiring additional formal care for a further 49,500 children.
The ABS figures also suggest a growing reliance on workplace flexibility in meeting child care needs:
The most frequently used arrangements were flexible working hours (41%) and permanent part-time work (25%). Overall, employed mothers were considerably more likely to make use of these types of work arrangements (73%) than employed fathers (34%). In couple families, 73% of employed mothers reported normally using these work arrangements compared to 71% of employed mothers in one parent families. In couple families, 33% of employed fathers used these work arrangements compared to 69% of employed fathers in one parent families.
Unsurprisingly, the child care burden continues to fall disproportionately on women:
The mother used work arrangements to help care for her children in almost three quarters (74%) of families with an employed mother, an increase from 70% in 2002. In comparison, 34% of fathers used work arrangements to help care for their children. This had increased from 30% in 2002.
No doubt, these work flexibility arrangements are more available to public sector and large company employees than small business employees.
The Sex Discrimination Commissioner has recently recommended a new maternity leave scheme:
“I will also be continuing to push for the implementation of a national paid parental scheme as part of a broader focus on achieving greater balance between paid work and family responsibilities.
“A federally funded scheme is good for families, good for business and good for the community. It gives mothers the chance to recover from childbirth, establish breast feeding and bond with their babies – it also increases the number of women returning to work.
Although the need for a maternity leave scheme is undeniable, concern is growing that the Rudd Government will not proceed with it in the current economic climate (here, here, and here).
Australia’s child care system has grown up in a haphazard way over the past few decades and, as Marie Coleman pointed out in March this year:
The total money involved now, subsidies and tax rebates together, comes close to two-thirds of federal expenditures on primary schools – perhaps as much as $3 billion a year. For all the money spent, it still has not produced a system which guarantees affordable, accessible good quality child care which satisfies the needs of parents.
Now might be just the time for a re-appraisal, to put effort into expanding the linking of child care to schools systems, and other not-for-profit systems.
So we are spending lots of money on a system that does not meet demand, and has been undermined further by the ABC and CFK problems.
It is time to look at the whole issue of work and children from birth to school and come up with a stable system that is available at reasonable cost for everyone. The Whitlam, Fraser, Hawke, Keating and Howard Governments all had an ad hoc go at it without really solving the problem.
Rudd and Gillard now have a real opportunity to put in place a social policy reform of a significance akin to universal health care and compulsory superannuation. A genuine revolution. Are they up for it? We shall see in the next Budget in May next year.
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