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| Child care places assured for all | ||||
| Could Australia follow in the steps of Germany? | ||||
 As of August 1st, in Germany, a new law came into effect that ensures a spot in day care for any child over 12 months of age. The new law allows parents to sue local authorities if they cannot get a place. It's hoped the new legislation will help cure the country's low birth rate, because fewer Germans now have children due to the difficulties of finding childcare and keeping their jobs and careers on track. Currently, Germany's birth rate, 1.39 children per woman, is one of the lowest in Europe, lower than Australia, which is still somewhere less than 2 per woman (latest 1.83 in 2010). Children of 3 years old and over were already assured of a child care place in Germany but with a the new law, which went into effect on August 1st, the age was lowered to 12 months old. So effectively the minute you finish maternity leave your child is assured of a spot and you can go back to work without the dreaded child care search. Similar to Norway, child care is subsidised in Germany and has been for some time, with parents paying a relatively small monthly contribution towards the fees. But while the cost of child is most definitely an issue to most families, the main problem in both Australia and other countries is the lack of places. In Germany, similar to Australia, there just weren't enough places to meet the demand. Parents often had to wait years for a slot to open up in a day care and many gave up their jobs in order to stay home with their children. In Germany the welfare system is incredibly generous in many areas, even though working mothers still carry an old stigma with the name Rabensmutter (raven mothers - ravens being birds who abandon their young) and some parts of society are still staunchly child "unfriendly". The new law for guaranteed childcare, however, meant that child care providers - both new and existing, scrambled to build, rebuild and renovate premises to house the new influx of children. According to some media all sorts of buildings were being converted, from theatres to car repair shops. And 90,000 promised day-care slots were still unready three weeks before the law went into effect. It remains to be seen if Germany's new system works and has managed to provide the required spaces. Surely there's something in the conversion of buildings alone as a means of helping to providing much needed child care places for the under 2s. There seems to be a great many empty and unleased office spaces, retail spaces and other buildings in Australia's major cities - just where child care places are needed. Rather than waiting for permission to build new ones, wouldn't it be better to make it easier to apply for change of use of existing buildings and give more incentive and support to would be child care providers to renovate in urban areas, where child care is needed most? We could have enough places for all under 2s in no time and in the right areas. Dear Tony, Please put this on your list of things to consider in the Productivity Commission Inquiry ;-) |
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Have you got unoccupied buildings near your office? What do you think about offering guaranteed, properly subsidised child care instead of rebates and benefits?
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