Fiona Nash (NSW, National Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you for the clarification. We were also discussing yester­day how the child care rebate relates to the funding that will be provided for the National Quality Framework and from memory you raised the issue of the change in ratios from one to five to one to four. My understanding is that be Department of Family and Community Services in New South Wales undertook some research that said when the new ratios were imposed, to one to four, the average cost increase per place for under twos was $7.59 a day and if you extrapolate that out over five days a week, 48 weeks of the year, it is an increase of around $1,800 a year. Is that research correct, or do you have any alternative view? I would expect if it was the department of community services doing the research then they would be a fairly reputable and reliable source of what the increased cost was going to be.