Childcare standards lag

SOME of the city’s longest established childcare centres still need to improve their services to meet national standards for quality seven years after the ratings were introduced.

But Education Minister Grace Grace defended the state’s regulation of the sector, while at the same time criticising the Federal Government for abandoning funding for regulation last year.

Meanwhile, representative body Early Childhood Australia, while acknowledging improvements have been made, says it is disappointing so many centres in Queensland are not reaching the highest standards.

In Townsville, about 16 per cent or 13 out of 80 long day care centres are assessed as “working towards” the standards.

Those centres are: Noahs Ark Kindergarten and Day Care Centre, Amaroo Early Childhood Centre, Playmate Daycare and Kindergarten, Kids In The Village, Galbiri Child Care & Pre School Centre, Townsville Grammar School Pre-prep Centre, Busy Kids Cranbrook Kindergarten and Child Care Centre, Milestones Early Learning Wulguru, Thuringowa World Of Learning, Kirwan Uniting Church Child Care Centre, Vickers Road Community Childcare Centre, Milestones Early Learning Kelso and Milestones Early Learning Bushland Beach.

The five-level rating is: “excellent”, “exceeds National Quality Standard”, “meets National Quality Standard”, “working towards National Quality Standard” and “significant improvement required”.

Ms Grace said a rating of “working towards National Quality Standards” was not a fail but an assessment centres needed improvement in “one or more areas”.

“This means that the service has been assessed as providing safe education and care but has one or more areas identified for improvement,” Ms Grace said.

Ms Grace said 65 of the 80 approved long day care providers in Townsville were rated as meeting or exceeding the national quality standard.

Two with new facilities were listed as “yet to be assessed”. “These statistics demonstrate that there is an appropriate level of regulation of childcare centres in Townsville,” Ms Grace said.

She said the Government was committed to quality in early childhood education, which was the reason they boosted funding for the regulation by an additional $26.5 million over two years in its last budget.

“The Palaszczuk Government’s increased investment in the regulation of early childhood services makes up for the Morrison Government, which walked away from its responsibilities and completely cut all federal funding for regulation last year,” Ms Grace said.