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committee's report

The committee tabled its report on 31 October 2011.

View:   Report No. 4, 53rd Parliament - Education and Care Services National Law (Queensland) Bill 2011
View:   Government Response
View:   Education and Care Services National Law (Queensland) Bill 2011 and the 
View:   Explanatory Notes 
View:   RBR201011 - Child Care in Queensland: Towards a National Quality Framework and Recent Amendments to the Child Care Act 2002 (Qld).

Referral

On 6^th September 2011 the Hon Cameron Dick, Minister for Education and Industrial Relations introduced the Education and Care Services National Law (Queensland) Bill 2011 into the Queensland Parliament. Subsequently, Parliament referred the Bill to its Industry, Education, Training and Industrial Relations Committee for detailed consideration.

The Bill

The principal objectives of the Bill are to –

1. apply the Education and Care Services National Law (the National Law) set out in the Schedule to the Education and Care Services National Law Act 2010 (Victoria) as a law of Queensland;
2. amend the Child Care Act 2002 so that it no longer applies to the early childhood education and care services that will be covered by the National Law;
3. to make consequential amendments to other legislation.

Background

In December 2009 the Council of Australian Government (COAG) endorsed the National Partnership Agreement on the National Quality Agenda for Early Childhood Education and Care (National Partnership Agreement). This included a commitment to establish a jointly governed, uniform National Quality Framework, and to facilitate the introduction of a new National Quality Standard for early childhood education and care services traditionally known as long day care services, family day care services, preschool (known as kindergarten in Queensland) and outside school hours care services.   The National Quality Standard includes measures to increase the qualifications of child care staff; and increase staff – child ratios.

The National Law will give effect to many elements of the National Partnership Agreement. 

There are other early childhood education and care services that would not be subject to the National Law. This includes some services that are currently licensed or regulated, for example: occasional care services; limited hours care services and some services that receive Commonwealth budget based funding. Nannies, babysitters, playgroups and child minding services in hotels, resorts and shopping centres are not included in these regulations.

The National Quality Framework

The National Quality Framework includes: the National Law; the National Regulations; the National Quality Standard; and the prescribed rating system.  It aims to provide a national approach to the regulation, assessment and quality improvement of early childhood education and care and outside hours school care by:

• creating a single system to replace existing separate licensing and quality assurance processes in each jurisdiction for pre-school (kindergartens in Queensland), long day care, family day care and outside school hours care;
• instituting a new national quality assessment and public rating system that gives primary responsibility for approval, monitoring and quality assessment of services to State and Territory Authorities; and
• establishing the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority to oversee the framework.

Key features of the National Law include:

• A perpetual service and provider approval system, which replaces Queensland’s existing three year licensing scheme;
• Assessment of providers and supervisors of education and child care services;
• Aligning management and oversight responsibilities;
• The ability to grant temporary and permanent waivers to ensure adequate flexibility;
• Power to publish information, including non-compliance information and each service’s rating level.

Exclusion of Queensland laws

Adoption of the National Law means that certain Commonwealth laws are applied as Queensland laws. To facilitate this, the Bill excludes the application of the Queensland Right to Information Act 2009 and the Information Privacy Act 2009 to give way to the National Law or subordinate instruments. The Bill also affects the Ombudsman Act 2001, the Auditor-General Act 2009, the Financial Accountability Act 2009, the Public Service Act 2008 and the Public Records Act 2002, except to the extent the National Law applies to the Regulatory Authority and its employees, decisions, actions and records.

Schedule 1 of the National Law contains miscellaneous interpretation provisions; therefore the Bill excludes application of the Acts Interpretation Act 1954 to the National Law.

The Bill also excludes application of Queensland’s Statutory Instruments Act 1992, except for section 303, thus allowing for disallowance of subordinate legislation.

Staff employed by the National Authority are not employed under Queensland’s Public Service Act 2008.

The Bill incorporates certain provision from the Child Care Act 2002 and the Child Protection Act 1999.

Funding

Commonwealth funding through the National Partnership Agreement will not meet the full cost to the government of implementing the National Quality Framework and specifically, the National Law, therefore the Department of Employment and Training will fund the implementation shortfall in 2010-11 and 2011-12, and will absorb any recurrent shortfall in national funding from 2012-13.  

timeline

Submission closed:    28 September 2011
Public Hearing:          12 October 2011 - Transcript 
Public Briefing:           7 September 2011 - Transcript
Report tabled on:      31 October 2011