Tammy Tyrrell (Tasmania, Jacqui Lambie Network) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am being flooded with messages from early childhood educators. They're understaffed, underresourced and underpaid, but we give them one of the most important jobs in the world to do. They're teaching our children manners, how to read and write and how to do basic sums. They work just as hard as teachers. For people like me who depended on child care to support us as working parents you need to trust the person who's looking after your child. You trust them with your child's education, safety and wellbeing. You trust them to help raise your children as good human beings. I still see the women who looked after my kids around Ulverstone today, and I love to stop them and have a chat. Sometimes we talk about what ratbags my kids were, or that time one of them fell through a glass door, and I apologise to that carer. Sorry to Rebecca for all the trauma that day; it was worse for you than for me or Liam, I'm pretty sure.

Early childhood educators are not paid enough for the work they do. You could work at Woolworths or on a spud harvester and be paid better than they are. No wonder we have a shortage of workers. In my patch of Tasmania there is a childcare centre that has 140 children on the waiting list. They can't operate at their licensed maximum capacity because of the lack of staff. The flow-on effect of this is huge. Parents end up having to choose between working and caring for their child. Employers miss out on staff because parents need to stay home, and the loss of income contributes to cost-of-living pressures. It really has a ripple effect. I think the pay for early childhood educators should reflect the work they do, and that's far more than they're getting right now. They give our kids a home away from home, and that shouldn't be undervalued.