CHILD CARE CHANGES LEAVING VULNERABLE CHILDREN OUT IN THE COLD

AMANDA RISHWORTH MP.
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5 years ago
CHILD CARE CHANGES LEAVING VULNERABLE CHILDREN OUT IN THE COLD
AMANDA RISHWORTH MP
The Liberals’ have been caught out trying to hide the impact their unfair child care changes are having on vulnerable Australian children.
 
The number of vulnerable and low-income families who are receiving the Additional Child Care Subsidy has fallen dramatically from 35,570 to 27,730 – more than a 20 per cent drop.
 
This is a direct result of the Liberals’ decision to swamp families and providers with red tape and restrictions, making it harder to access the payment and putting early learning out of reach for these families.
 
As part of Scott Morrison’s latest attempt to cover up just how out of touch the Liberals are, they dumped the September 2018 quarter data on the Department’s website against convention and in the dead of night.
 
The Child Care in Summary reports from the Department of Education and Training have been compiled and released quarterly for many years and contain key data on information including child care service numbers, children in care, child care costs and the number of children accessing subsidy types. These reports have been released under all governments for years and, up to this week, had been an uncontroversial, standard resource for the sector.
 
This is the first batch of data that examines the impact of the Liberals’ new child care system, which was introduced in July 2018.
 
It is now clear why they are trying to evade scrutiny of this data.
 
We know, from all the evidence, that these are the children who need early learning the most.
 
Labor has always been concerned about the impact of the Liberals’ new system on low income and vulnerable families. That is why we voted against these changes.
 
Labor has been asking the Department for data for months and have been denied at every attempt. It is clear now why.
 
The Liberals have made a mess of their unfair child care changes, which are hurting vulnerable families.
 
This once again proves how out of touch the Liberals are and the need to immediately act to fix their mess.
 
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