Childcare in rating swipe

THE Far Northern owner of two childcare centres that have been named as failing national standards, has revealed major flaws with the early education assessment.

News Corp reported on Saturday the almost 450 childcare centres across the state are failing to meet national standards for quality care seven years after the ratings were introduced.

Several childcare centres, family day care, and after school care providers across the Far North were named as “working towards” the National Quality Standard, with one Cairns centre receiving the worst “significant improvement required” rating in April.

Tania Williams, who with her husband Les owns several childcare centres across the Far North, said she was horrified to find two of their businesses, Junior World at Bentley Park, and Butterflies Early Learning & Childcare at Mooroobool on the extensive name and shame list.

Neither of the businesses were identified as requiring significant improvement.

However, Ms Williams said Junior World and Butterflies had not yet been assessed under their new management, with the previous assessments having taken place at least two years ago.

“The assessment of Junior World was for Johnny Crow’s which we purchased 11 months ago,” she said. “It’s now under a different owner.

“We also purchased Butterflies about six months ago, and we haven’t been assessed yet.

“We feel that to be named on this list is really unfair, and an error, and really damaging.”

She said both centres were due to be assessed under the new National Quality Standard next year.

The State Government has budgeted an extra $26.5 million over two years for child care regulation, after its funding agreement with the Commonwealth ended.

Queensland Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington told reporters on Saturday that while many childcare centres were doing the right thing, the report was “deeply disturbing”.

She said there needed to be an investigation into why some centres across the state were being assessed regularly while others were not.

“We’ve got some childcare centres that haven’t been inspected for years, some that have been inspected up to three times a year, and some centres who haven’t even been inspected at all,” she said.