The government continues to remove red tape, this time to help early learners thrive
The Government is making legislative changes to make it easier for new early learning services to be established and for existing services to operate, Associate Minister David Seymour says.
The changes involve repealing the network approval provisions that apply when someone wants to establish a new early learning service and stopping the introduction of new person responsible requirements that were taking effect in August of this year.
"Providers and parents are best placed to decide where early learning services should be established. Where there's demand from parents, providers will follow," says Seymour.
"Current network approval provisions introduced by Labour give government the right to decide where services should be. They also make setting up new services complex and inhibit competition."
"This gets in the way of early childhood professionals delivering effective, affordable and accessible services to parents and their children. We have to understand what the purpose of regulation is, and ensure whether, on balance, regulation is the appropriate tool to use."
The Government also intends to make it easier for service providers to ensure key supervisory roles are filled. Removing the new requirement for a higher level of certification will mean that persons responsible will not need to obtain a Full (Category One or Two) Practising Certificate.
"The requirement had the potenital to result in increased fees, reduced operating hours, or even closure for some services, due to lack of fully certified teachers," says Seymour.
"Services in rural areas and lower socio-economic areas were likely to suffer due to staffing and funding challenges."
Teachers will still need to a recognised teaching qualification and a practising certificate and all early learning services will still need to comply with current licensing requirements including all relevant health and safety regulations.
Implementation of the requirements for changing the identity of the service provider on the service licence are also on hold following concerns raised by the sector.
"Early learning centres are a key part of our education system and are important for working parents who need somewhere to affordably send their children," says Seymour.
The Government has also signalled its intention to review all regulations governing the early childhood education sector, with the newly created Ministry of Regulation conducting a regulatory review.
"We need to strip unnecessary compliance and cost so our early learning professionals can be focussed on education and care of children. After all, costs cannot be absorbed - they eventually land on the parents."
