Wage Justice for Early Childhood Education and Care Workers (Special Account) (Extending Support and Strengthening Safety) Bill 2026

Ms CLUTTERHAM (Sturt) (16:59): I rise today to speak in support of the Wage Justice for Early Childhood Education and Care Workers (Special Account) (Extending Support and Strengthening Safety) Bill 2026. We often say that early childhood educators do some of the most important work in the world, but historically we haven't always followed those words with actions.

Some have wrongly and continually referred to this work as 'babysitting' or just looking after the kids while mum and dad are at work, but it is so much more than that. Early childhood educators are qualified. Their training equips them with skills in early learning curriculum design, child psychology, wellbeing and pedagogy.

It helps them do many things in any given day, including planning, implementing and evaluating learning programs tailored to children's interests, strengths and needs. It trains them to create inclusive environments where every child feels a sense of belonging. It trains them to monitor and document children's progress and development, sharing insights with families.

It equips them with skills to support an incredibly diverse range of children in developing key skills such as communication, problem solving, creativity and emotional regulation. It teaches them how to effectively collaborate with families and colleagues to ensure children are supported holistically. It's teaching.

It's mentoring. It's caring. It's planning.

It's leading. It's developing solutions. It's identifying challenges and overcoming them.

It's casting a keen eye over the welfare and development of a child. It's all of these things, but what it is not is 'babysitting' or just looking after a few kids. It's hard work.

In 2016, I was living in Sydney, and my sister was living in Canberra. She'd just had a little girl, Caitlin, my niece. Hello, Caitlin, in case you ever read Hansard or watch this speech.

You were the first baby in the family. I love being your aunty, and you will always be my girl. When Caitlin was around seven months old, Lisa, my sister, needed to finish her master's in law at ANU by attending a full day of lectures.

I offered to take a day of leave, come to Canberra and look after Caitlin by myself for a day. I have a stepdaughter, but she came into my life when she was 5½. Since I don't have my own children, I hadn't had much experience in caring for really little people.

I thought, 'Well, how hard can it be?' I recall getting there, Lisa leaving and Caitlin lying there asleep looking adorable. How hard can it be? Then she woke.

We read a couple of books. She had tummy time on the floor. We played with a few soft toys.

I jiggled her around in front of the mirror so she could see herself, and I sang a few rounds of 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star'. Then, I looked at my watch, and I'd had her for 30 minutes and I was already tired and out of ideas. I tried to bottle feed her.

She screamed and spat milk at me, and I was done. How hard could it be? Well, it's hard.

It's hard work. I've since looked after Caitlin, who is now 10, and my beautiful nephew Jack, who is now seven, when they were younger. Just like it was when I had Caitlin when she was seven months old—as my niece and nephew hit two years, three years, four years old, it was always a privilege to care for them, but it was always hard work, and these were my niece and nephew, my family.

Imagine displaying even more dedication, more patience, more empathy and more creativity for up to 10 children who are not your family, and you're doing this for 40 hours a week. Early childhood educators who do this do it because they care deeply for the children that they are educating. They care about their welfare, their development, their mental health and their happiness.

They do it because they love it. I've met them. I've met them at Goodstart Early Learning on Payneham Road and Grand Junction Road.

I've met them at the Wattle Park Kindergarten. I've met them at Nido Early School at Athelstone and Paradise. I've met them at St Peter's Early Learning Centre, and I've met them at Kozy Kids Glenside.

This is just a fraction of early childhood educators in just my electorate who do the job because they love it. But the reality is they can't do it if they can't pay the bills, if they're not paid fairly. If they're not paid fairly, they'll leave, even if they don't want to.

As I said, the early childhood workers I've met don't want to, because they love what they do and they know that it is meaningful, satisfying and important work. Historically, though, attrition rates at some early childhood education centres were as high as 40 per cent, which, frankly, is a figure that means there was a crisis. That has now changed, because the Albanese Labor government not only said that the work early childhood educators do is important, and not only said that we value workers dedicating themselves to educating children; the Albanese Labor government also followed those words with action and, almost two years ago, delivered a 15 per cent pay rise to those workers.

When combined with the government's support for minimum-wage rises, this means $255 more per week for a typical full-time educator and $410 more per week for early childhood teachers, compared to December 2024, when the increases were first implemented. We've got the data to prove that this strategy has worked with respect to both recruitment and retention, with job vacancies down 31 per cent and job applications up 30 per cent in that time.

This important bill locks in that pay rise with an investment of $3.6 billion over the next two years, and it works by amending the Wage Justice for Early Childhood Education and Care Workers (Special Account) Act 2024, extending the sunset date for that act from 30 June 2028 to 31 December 2029. It also credits the special account that is used to administer the early childhood education and care worker retention payment grant to relevant providers to fund higher wages for eligible workers.

Now, as long as the grant requirements are met, all childcare subsidy approved services will be eligible for funding. The grant requirements are not just check boxes; they are important and they are deliberately designed. Firstly, all educators must be engaged under a workplace instrument—a legally enforceable document that sets out the terms and conditions of employment like rates of pay, leave entitlements, penalties, loadings and working hours.

This requirement is driven by a need to ensure that the investment this government is making is passed on to early childhood educators in the form of higher wages. Secondly, early childhood education providers have to limit fee increases. Fee increases adversely impact families, and fair and reasonable limitations alleviate this.

We know that, in the first year of the program, providers in receipt of the payment have increased fees at only about half the rate of centres that didn't sign up, so the program will save families around $1,500 over the next two years, which is a meaningful amount of money in anyone's book. Thirdly, and importantly, the bill links the funding to quality standards.

To receive the funding, services will be required to meet quality area 2, relating to children's health and safety, under the National Quality Standard. If they don't, their funding will be cut. Quality area 2 of the National Quality Standard is about health and safety, and it includes matters that parents are entitled to expect, which is why it's encouraging that around 95 per cent of centres are currently compliant.

Parents like the member for Macnamara, who has brought his beautiful daughter into the House of Representatives, should be entitled to expect that each child's wellbeing and comfort is provided for, including appropriate opportunities to meet each child's need for sleep, rest and relaxation. Parents should have comfort that effective illness and injury management and hygiene practices are being promoted and implemented, and that healthy eating and physical activity are promoted and appropriate for each child.

Parents should also have comfort that in every second of every day reasonable precautions and adequate supervision are in place to ensure children are protected from harm and hazards, and that plans to effectively manage incidents and emergencies are developed in consultation with the relevant authorities and then practised and implemented. Parents are also entitled to expect that centre management, educators and staff are aware of their roles and responsibilities regarding child safety, including the need to identify and respond to every child at risk of abuse or neglect.

Parents should expect this. Providers should provide this, and 95 per cent do, but we need to lift that to 100 per cent, because that is what parents are entitled to expect and that is what children deserve. We know that threats to cut off funding work.

The Department of Education has taken compliance action against 119 centres, with just under half able to quickly and effectively lift their approach to meet the relevant standards. The threat of cuts to funding works, but it's not just a threat, because this government will act and has, in fact, cut off funding to a service. This government will follow through, and it will act when quality standards regarding a child's health and safety are not being met.

The powers instilled in the Department of Education by this bill to make unannounced visits to childcare centres also mean that services not meeting the quality standards will be exposed and will have their funding cut. Since November last year, Australian government authorised officers have conducted more than 1,300 unannounced visits to providers across the country.

Early childhood educators do some of our most important work, but it's not enough to just say this. The Albanese Labor government has not just said this. It has acted.

This bill acknowledges the value we must place on early childhood educators, the value we must place on families who use their services and the value we must always place on children. Without the bill, workers would be at risk of reduced pay, families would be at risk of substantially higher out-of-pocket fees, and children would be at risk of care that is not of the highest quality.

This bill is action. This bill puts our words into action, and I commend the bill to the House.