Abstract 

Of great concern within the Ministry for Regulation’s 2024 Regulatory Review of Early Childhood Education report was Recommendation number 10 that aims for greater flexibility in qualifications within the early childhood education (ECE) workforce. The recommendation directly undermines current policy objectives within the Early Learning Action Plan (2019–2029) which aspire towards a goal of 100% qualified teachers. Taking a strongly market-based approach to ECE and privileging the interests of business owners and market performance over the experiences of children, families, and teachers, a series of new market-related problems associated with qualifications have been produced within the review and used to frame the recommended change. This paper explores how the scene has been set for this call for qualification diversification and argues that the direction of travel is wrong-headed if ECE is to thrive, as the report claims it should.