More kids left in 50-hour childcare

THE number of children spending 50-plus hours a week in childcare is growing as parents work longer to try to make ends meet.

News Corp can reveal 40,241 children used long daycare for 50 or more hours a week — or more than 10 hours a day — in the latest June quarter figures, up 17 per cent from 34,275 in the previous March quarter.

And fees for childcare are also continuing to grow, with a 3.6 per cent hourly fee growth for long day care from the June quarter 2016 and an average 2.7 per cent growth for all childcare services including before and after school care.

However the percentage growth of fees has dramatically come down since 2009 when it was as high as 12.9 per cent.

The Federal Government’s Early Childcare in Summary report has shown proportionally 5.9 per cent of all children in long day care are spending 50 or more hours per week at the centre.

This compares to 4.9 per cent in the March quarter.

A further 12.7 per cent were spending 40-50 hours in care a week and 23.1 per cent were spending 30-40 hours a week, according to the figures.

In June 2016 there were 123,489 children in long day care for more than 40 hours a week. The latest data available, for last June, showed the number has risen 2.7 per cent to 126,863 children.

The report also shows parents are struggling to obtain vacation care during school holidays.

In June 2015, 72 per cent of reporting services advised they had vacancies, while in the latest June 2017 quarter just 67 per cent of providers reported having vacancies.

Parents are paying on average $9.20 an hour for long day care, $8.80 an hour for family day care and in-home care, $10.25 an hour for occasional care and $7.20 an hour for outside school hours care.

Education Minister Simon Birmingham said the growth in child care fees was at its lowest level in a decade.

“The Turnbull Government has worked hard to keep the lid on fee increases,” he said.