Q&A Sussan Ley Shadow Minister for Child Care & Early Learning

Q&A Sussan Ley
Shadow Minister for Child Care & Early Learning

As a part of our monthly newsletter for child care providers we are running a series of profiles designed to further educate our readers about Australia's most important government departments, community and industry organisations and how they work to support the child care industry, and also to put a face to the names of these organisations.

This month we feature a Q&A with Sussan Ley Shadow Minister for Child Care & Early Learning

What does your current role as Shadow Minister for Child Care and Early Learning entail? Do you have experience in the child care sector?
Perhaps the best part of the job is getting to spend a significant amount of time in a sandpit or play area learning from the 'experts' and of course their educators and carers.

The immediate task for me is finalising the terms-of-reference for a Productivity Commission inquiry into child care if we are returned to Government.

I guess my experience with the child care sector started off as a consumer, with my children attending family day care, long day, occasional care or preschool. As a then farmer's wife I can tell you a mobile service would have been fantastic as back up for those times when I was feeding calves, cooking for the shearers or going into town to get supplies.

What are your primary objectives/goals within the Australian child care sector?
As I see it, achieving a balanced work and family lifestyle is the biggest challenge facing young Australian families. Providing the best possible quality care that is both affordable and available is what most parents are after. Child care is a service industry after all, so if we're not delivering – or can't deliver that - then the consumer looks elsewhere.

How are you working to achieve those goals?
In the four months since Tony Abbott announced our plans for a Productivity Commission inquiry, we have held 27 roundtables with child care operators across each service stream and across the nation. The feedback from your members has made me more determined than ever to help make Australian child care more accessible, affordable and flexible to current needs again.

That's not impossible to achieve but it does take consultation and a willingness to investigate the red tape or restrictions not allowing this to happen in the areas it should.

How is the opposition working to help child care professionals do their jobs?
ABS data tells us around 110,000 people, mainly mums, are not in the workforce as a result of not being able to find or afford suitable child care. The other hat I wear for the Coalition is as
Shadow Minister for Employment Participation and I know nothing is more frustrating than finding a job, or going back to work, but not being able to find the child care you need to do so.

For the sector itself it is simple mathematics. There are not enough qualified educators becoming available to meet the demands of the new National Quality Framework.

With that in mind, in child care, great qualifications alone don't always make you a great candidate for the job and I would also argue some of the training on offer is sub par and not even teaching the Early Years Learning or the National Quality Framework requirements.

Do you agree with the current reform agenda and all of the new quality standards being introduced by Labor?
I support the EYLF and I do support the higher staff to children ratios and the push towards "professionalising" the industry. I believe that quality care is paramount. However, my view on what constitutes quality and the Minister's may differ.

Quality needs to be all about the children, yet many centre staff are forced to focus on a pile of new administrative rules and regulations which result, perversely, in a diminishing focus on care and early learning.

Why has child care become such a hot topic in Australia over the last few years?
For many families, child care is now the second largest household running cost after their mortgage. Despite what the Government claims it is spending on child care, ABS CPI data shows fees have increased an average 17 per cent since Prime Minister Gillard was elected. If you add the extra $5 to $20 a day many child care centres are now forced to, just to satisfy the NQF standards, then its little wonder child care is so much in the news. The family budget can only take so much before people resort to 'backyard' or unregulated care, or cut back working hours.

I don't want to see that and I am sure the Gillard Government does not want to either, but unfortunately it is happening.

How is Australia's child care sector changing?
The one constant thing in life is change and the models of child care that suited Australia even five years ago don't necessarily suit us now.

Good or bad, we are increasingly becoming a 24/7 workforce. CBD retail stores no longer close at 5pm, many office workers push well past a 38 hour week while shift workers, such as those in factories or nursing or call centres can't always be there at the exact time for a pick up or drop off.

For the sector to meet this demand it needs the room to be able to deliver what families want. I see it as my job to help them do that.