Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education, Childcare, Women and Youth) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

: to move—

That the House:

(1)

condemns the Government for its failure to publicly release childcare vacancy data in light of the current crisis which has been unfolding in the industry with the collapse of ABC Learning;

(2)

notes that childcare operators are required to provide their vacancy data to the Rudd Government on a weekly basis;

(3)

acknowledges that the childcare industry cannot possibly undertake long term planning without data that will allow it to determine the location of demand hotspots or areas of chronic undersupply;

(4)

calls on the Government to inform the industry what data and information it used to identify the location of the first 38 of its Early Learning and Care Centres and what data and information it intends to use to locate the remaining 222 Early Learning and Care Centres; and

(5)

notes that the Government has provided $56 million worth of taxpayers’ funds to maintain ABC Learning childcare centres, 55 of which have been closed, and more which will be forced to close by 31 March, at the same time as it continues to implement its policy of building 260 new Early Learning and Care Centres.)