The Victorian Greens will move to establish a powerful parliamentary inquiry into Victoria\u2019s early childhood education and care (ECEC) system this week and have called on Labor to commit to releasing key documents relating to safety and regulation in childcare, after they missed the deadline last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Greens will push for a select committee, saying it\u2019s needed to fill the gaping holes in Labor\u2019s own review, amid growing concern over the lack of transparency and accountability in how the childcare sector is regulated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The move comes as the Greens today table a letter to the Premier, formally calling on the Labor Government to commit to releasing the documents requested by the Greens which was respectfully drafted to ensure identifying details are redacted to protect children\u2019s privacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Greens say they understand more time may be needed to do this thoroughly, but that the public deserves a firm commitment that the documents will eventually be released, and a clear timeline to go with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While Labor continues to operate in secrecy – and with their narrow review fails to examine how the Department of Education regulates the sector – the Greens say a broader inquiry is essential to understanding the full scale of the crisis and how to fix it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The proposed select committee would be chaired by a non-government member to ensure transparency and independence. It would have the power to call witnesses, compel documents, and investigate both government and private childcare providers. It will require the support of the Opposition and additional crossbench members to pass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The inquiry would examine the consequences of Victoria\u2019s increasingly privatised childcare system, unsafe staff-to-child ratios, poor workforce conditions, weak oversight, and critically, the Department\u2019s role in regulating the sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Victorian Greens spokesperson for Early Childhood, Anasina Gray-Barberio:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf we want to fix this crisis, we need to understand the full scale of the problem. Labor\u2019s narrow review avoids scrutiny of their own regulation while they\u2019ve been marking their own homework. We need this inquiry to fill in the gaps.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis Labor government consistently fails to be transparent and accountable. I\u2019ve written to the Premier with a yes or no question, are you going to release these documents? We understand that redacting private information takes time and we support that but families need assurance they\u2019re not going to be left in the dark.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Victorian Greens will move to establish a powerful parliamentary inquiry into Victoria\u2019s early childhood education and care (ECEC) system this week and have called on Labor to commit to releasing key documents relating to safety and regulation in childcare, after they missed the deadline last week. The Greens will push for a select committee, … Continue reading “GREENS PUSH FOR URGENT INVESTIGATION INTO VICTORIA\u2019S BROKEN CHILDCARE SYSTEM AS LABOR FAILS TO COMMIT TO RELEASING KEY DOCUMENTS”<\/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-33989","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\/33989","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=33989"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33990,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33989\/revisions\/33990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}