Excerpt
Labor’s new childcare minister says she will drive shonky and dangerous operators out of the multibillion-dollar industry, warning providers that place profit above safety will be shut down.
In her first major interview since joining the frontbench, Victorian senator Jess Walsh told Guardian Australia the federal government was slowly moving towards a universal childcare system in Australia, something the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, wants as part of his “legacy”.
Childcare has been beset by safety and standards failures, including serious and violent incidents at centres, recently investigated by the ABC.
“Those images and stories are really hard to watch and hard to read about, and it is a top priority for the commonwealth and the states and the quality authority to work together, shoulder to shoulder,” Walsh said.
Walsh said she was working with states and territories to enforce safety standards, and that reforms such as restricting mobile phone use by early childhood educators, which were put in place last year, was one “lever” being used to improve safety in the sector.
“We will use new commonwealth levers to target those operators that put profit above child safety … They should not be operating in the sector,” she said.
“And we will make sure that commonwealth funding does not support their expansion and that we’re able to restrict their access to the childcare subsidy, because commonwealth shouldn’t be subsidising those operators that have no place in the sector.”
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