Free childcare in crisis

CHILD care will be free for parents still using it during the coronavirus crisis.

The Federal Government will also support the nation’s 13,000 childcare centres to remain open after enrolment and attendance numbers plummeted.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said child care was an essential service to keep all parents who still had jobs in the current economy in that work. The government will pay half the reasonable fee cap to centres for the next six months as long as they remain open and don’t charge parents fees.

The funding will start from Monday and will cover enrolments as they stood in the fortnight leading up to March 2, before people started pulling their kids out of care en masse due to losing their jobs or out of health fears.

Fee subsidies will not be means or activity tested while this system is in place.

Centres must seek to reenrol children who were withdrawn so parents can keep places for after the crisis.

Education Minister Dan Tehan said the aim was to make sure parents won’t have to worry about trying to find new care for their children.

It’s also expected the childcare sector will be able to access $1 billion in the JobKeeper wage subsidy payments.

Queensland is closing all national parks, walking tracks and 4WD areas as the state’s coronavirus death toll rose yesterday and a full border lockdown took effect from midnight last night.

A man died in hospital after contracting coronavirus in Queensland, bringing the state death toll to three and the national toll to 23.

The Darling Downs man aged 85 died in Toowoomba.

Four Queenslanders have died, including one who died in Sydney after being infected aboard a cruise ship there.

Queensland authorities confirmed that 57 new people have been infected, taking the state’s total to 835.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is ramping up the coronavirus crackdown as people continue to ignore the ban on non-essential travel.

“We are still getting hundreds of people coming across our border,” the Premier told Seven Network before warning: “No permit, no pass come Friday.”

Ms Palaszczuk said all Australians

must prepare for a long period living under severe restrictions, including not leaving home unless it’s really necessary.

“The minimum I’m hearing is six months. If we flatten that curve, we are not going to reach the peaks until well into the middle of this year,” she said.

The Premier is also threatening to shut Queensland’s beaches as a result of people continuing to ignore social distancing.