The Greens say new early childhood education and care safety measures, announced by both state and federal governments this week, fall far short of what\u2019s needed \u2014 a national, independent watchdog with real power to keep children safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This week\u2019s horrifying abuse allegations in Victorian childcare centres have once again exposed a system in crisis. The time for piecemeal, reactive measures is over. What\u2019s needed is a regulator with the authority to enforce safety standards, and drive sector-wide reform. The Greens have already put forward a fully costed plan<\/u><\/a> to establish this national body earlier this year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Senator Steph Hodgins-May is urging the government to work with the Greens to deliver this real reform to early childhood education when parliament resumes in 2.5 weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Earlier this week, the Greens called for a Royal Commission into the safety and quality of early childhood education and care. The Government, to date, has dismissed these calls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Australian Greens spokesperson for early childhood education and care, Senator Steph Hodgins-May:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFollowing this week\u2019s horrifying reports which laid bare serious failings by the early learning system, we\u2019re reiterating our call for a national watchdog with teeth to keep our kids safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis independent watchdog would enforce quality standards, act swiftly on safety breaches, and drive a shift toward universal, high-quality care \u2014 not just retrospective patch-ups.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFamilies are feeling anxious and are counting on us to act now. Reactive band-aid solutions won\u2019t keep children safe or move us towards the child-centred system we need for the future. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe Greens have a costed plan to establish this national regulator, and we\u2019re ready to get to work with the Government to deliver this urgent reform before the end of the year.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Greens say new early childhood education and care safety measures, announced by both state and federal governments this week, fall far short of what\u2019s needed \u2014 a national, independent watchdog with real power to keep children safe. This week\u2019s horrifying abuse allegations in Victorian childcare centres have once again exposed a system in crisis. … Continue reading “Band-aid fixes won\u2019t protect children, Greens ready to work with Government to deliver a national independent early learning watchdog with teeth”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33545"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33545\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33546,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33545\/revisions\/33546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}