TRANSCRIPT
The childcare industry is said to be in crisis, and families are feeling the strain.
As Australia continues to battle a teacher shortage, a new report from the United Workers Union shows how low pay and under-staffing is affecting operations in the sector.
The study surveyed more than 1000 Early Learning Centres across the country, exploring the magnitude of the impact on the workforce.
Helen Gibbons, Director of Early Education at the United Workers Union says Educators are hurting and it is directly impacting children.
“It's pretty damning results. We found that an enormous amount of centres, nearly two thirds said that the wellbeing or safety of children has been impacted by the staffing shortages. And we also found that about 80 percent of centres can't access the families can't access the days that they need. So what we're seeing is that children are not in the best learning environment sometimes because of the shortages. And we're also seeing that families can't get the sort of care that they need because of the shortages. It's an awful situation. An awful situation.”
Ms Gibbons says low pay in the early education sector is the most prominent reason why workers are being driven away.
She believes that a pay rise will help stabilize the industry.
Ms Gibbons says low pay in the early education sector is the most prominent reason why workers are being driven away.
She believes that a pay rise will help stabilize the industry.
"More and more people are leaving. And the more people that leave, the harder it is for those people who are left behind. And this isn't just about how that's awful for early educators. What we found in our survey was that that's also pretty awful for children and families. It's a situation that can't go on, it's escalating, and we have to fix the problem. Otherwise, this sector is going to fall apart."
Jessica Rudd, Chief Executive of advocacy group The Parenthood says parents are also on the receiving end of the heat from the crisis as it results in many being unable to work.
"Parents are desperate to access early childhood education and care for their children. They want this not only for educational outcome for their kids, they also just need to be able to participate in the workforce. This is a cost of living crisis. And parents need to be able to go to work and know that their children are being taken care of."
According to the Department of Education, over 90 percent of childcare workers are women.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics says caring for children remains the largest barrier to female participation in the labour force.
Its latest report shows there were 2.8 million people in 2020 to 2021 who did not work full-time, 1.7 million people who either wanted a job or were working part-time, and 1.1 million people who wanted to increase their working hours.
And one in seven were not available to work or work more hours within a four week period with around two-thirds of them being women.
President of the Australian Parents Council Jenny Branch-Allen, says parents - especially women - have reported a disruption to their daily lives.
"We are hearing from parents that they are having trouble accessing childcare for their children, especially those trying to re-enter the workforce, the struggle of being on waiting lists, not being able to get times that suit their working hours is becoming a problem across Australia."
The Albanese government released a $72.4 million dollar fund to boost the Early Childhood Education Workforce, benefiting more than 80,000 educators in regional and remote services and First Nations organisations.
But Vice President of the Australian Childcare Alliance Neesha Hutchinson says more needs to be done to save families and the industry.
["Families are paying a lot. If we increase wages, fees will increase and we need the government to step up and address that, so that it's not out of pocket for families. We are working with the union to negotiate a good outcome. And the final part of that puzzle is the federal government coming to the table and agreeing to fund the wage rises. And we're really looking forward to the process and have a lot of faith that it's going to bring a good outcome for our sector."
Minister for Finance and women affairs Katie Gallagher says the government is taking steps to make Australia more equal in terms of gender and economics.
"We are genuinely trying to shift the dial here looking at how we can use the money we have available to really drive some of the change we need to see across the economy. I mean, it just doesn't make sense to have 50 percent of our population not working in a country, you know, contributing into the economy in ways that they want to. And some of that is linked to childcare. Some of that's linked to support for caring roles. I mean, when you look at the data, it's so clear, you know, 70 percent of the part time workforce in this country are women."
