Page 2413 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 13 August 2014
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
ensure the best start for the youngest members of the community by increasing preschool hours from 10 to 12 hours per week. This placed the ACT within the top jurisdictions nationally for providing the most hours of preschool education per week.
This move was further supported in 2009, when the ACT signed the national partnership agreement on universal access to early childhood education. This agreement provided the ACT with $13.2 million over five years to further increase preschool hours from 12 to 15 hours. We joined with the then federal Labor government in partnership because of the clear evidence that 15 hours of preschool has a great benefit to these early learners.
The ACT government has also worked on building workforce capability by offering scholarships to teachers to upgrade to a four-year early childhood degree, and funding for preschool assistants to study certificate III traineeships. The ACT’s staged implementation allowed for funding to be first targeted towards meeting the needs of our most vulnerable and disadvantaged children, as well as our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
In addition to the Australian government investment the ACT government has committed $318,000 across four years to the implementation of the preschool matters program. The preschool matters program recognises the central role of parents in their child’s education. This investment has a multiplier effect and it provides significantly greater return from the $13.2 million of universal access funding than would otherwise be realised. Finally, and I think most importantly, all 79 ACT public preschools offer 15 hours free preschool education per week for 40 weeks per year.
Sadly, Madam Speaker, all of this great work is now in jeopardy. The current national partnership agreement on universal access to early childhood education between the ACT and the Australian government expires on 31 December 2014. The Australian government has not indicated whether funding to support 15 hours will be continued beyond 2014, leaving great uncertainty amongst parents and educators as to the future of preschool programs in 2015. Without continued Australian government support, 15 hours of free preschool education in the ACT cannot be maintained.
Whilst this is a sad moment in education in Australia, it is not wholly without precedent from the current Abbott government. We have already seen them walk back from the supposed unity ticket on school funding, leaving great uncertainty as to the future of funding to some of our most disadvantaged school students in both the ACT and across Australia. We have also seen them try to walk back from the national quality framework, and dismissing quality in early childhood education and care as simply red tape. And we have seen them dismiss the calls for pay equity amongst early childhood educators as simply a union scam, as if asking for a living wage that recognises your skill and dedication is an outrageous notion.
It is greatly disappointing to me and to the families in my electorate that important matters such as access to quality education and care can so simply be cast aside by some in this place and compared with a luxury item only for the wealthy to afford. If the Australian government do not continue to support universal access, they will risk losing much of the significant gains already made in early childhood education both nationally and in the ACT.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video