I have an 18-month-old and I'd like to have a second child. But one of the main things pulsing *warning, warning* in my head at the thought is the cost of daycare.
From a family planning perspective, I would like the gap between my children to not be more than a few years. But from a financial perspective, it paints a grim picture. The cost of one child going to daycare is exorbitant but the cost of two, simultaneously, is eye-watering. Financially, childcare costs are leaving couples scrambling.
Today, finally, we've seen some tangible movement in the right direction.
On Wednesday, the Albanese government announced sweeping changes that aim to 'fell two birds with one stone,' funding a 15 per cent wage increase for Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) workers, phased over two years. This raise will be given with the caveat that centres have limits on fee rises, protecting parents already paying huge sums towards childcare.
Announcing the changes, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said, "Early educators shape lives and change lives. We can never thank them enough for what they do—but we can make sure they are properly valued and fairly paid. Today our Government is doing just that.
"Knowing your child is safe, happy and learning alongside their friends is priceless. Giving the next generation the best start in life is essential. Today we deliver fair pay for the people who make this possible."
Listen to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese interviewed on The Quicky here. Post continues below.
Anthony Albanese told us his plan to improve women's livelihoods.
Speaking on Mamamia's podcast The Quicky on Thursday, the Prime Minister outlined his plans to improve the lives of women across the country, highlighting that childcare reform is just one piece of a greater movement.
"We have put gender equity as one of the objectives...across the board, so this is a part of that drive," he said. "We know the gender pay gap has been reduced to the lowest level ever of 13 per cent, but we want to see that reduced further.
"We'd like to see it disappear."
He said that while it's a process to undo all the ways women are disadvantaged, especially "unscrambling the egg" that is the private childcare sector, the government is looking at sweeping reform in multiple ways to support them.
"This is why we're increasing paid parental leave, why we made the changes to the single parenting payment. Superannuation of paid parental leave is coming in as well.
"All of these are measures aimed at recognising that when women retire, because of the nature of the workforce... they haven't been able to fully participate as a group in our economy with the same reward economically as men.
"So, we need to look at the full range of measures, making sure this is a part of our gender equity policy.
"We know that it's the feminised industries, like aged care and childcare, that have seen work undervalued in the past and we want to address that," he told host Claire Murphy.
Childcare reform is a major step in the right direction.
The childcare sector in Australia has a long way to go, and while change doesn’t happen overnight, these are big first steps to ensure a better future for women who are planning to have children or already have them.
"There are various options we can have going forward, but the investments that have been made [in the past] means it's hard to unscramble the egg," said Albanese, referring to the fact that childcare is largely run by private businesses.
"What we want to do is to make sure we work with the system that we've got to consider how we increase accessibility and how we also value it in a way that sees it not as something that is a privilege, but as something that is a part of society's commitment to our youngest Australians and families.
He added that he sees Scandinavian countries' childcare arrangements as a kind of 'gold standard'.
This announcement represents a well-deserved pay bump for a workforce that has been disregarded for too long, and while the pay rise is primarily designed to relieve the pressures on stretched childhood educators, there are stipulations to help parents.
The stipulation is that for centres to receive the 15 per cent wage raise, they will not be able to increase their fees by more than 4.4 per cent over the next 12 months, starting August 8, 2024. This condition is designed to put downward pressure on the rising costs of child care for families.
What does this announcement signal for the future?
It's not a huge win for parents yet, as fees aren't decreasing, but at least they won't be continuing to climb.
The reason it's exciting is because for so long we've been promised movement on the cost of childcare. Labor went to the 2022 federal election with the ambition of delivering universal child care, something they reiterated this year as a primary goal.
That's never going to be something that happens overnight.
The Albanese government has boosted childcare subsidies (which did help cut costs for some families) and kicked off Productivity Commission and Australian Competition and Consumer Commission investigations into the sector.
By committing to a decent wage increase for educators, the Albanese government has committed to important economic reform for women in an overwhelmingly female sector.
This announcement is important because it sends a message.
As Goodstart Early Learning, Australia’s largest not for profit provider of long day care told The Sector, the announcement will go down in history for "supporting women’s workforce participation".
Albanese added, "This brings together the priorities that drive our government: real help with the cost of living, fair wages for workers, investing in the future and economic equality for women."
Perhaps it's problematic to be this excited over a long overdue pay rise (that is actually smaller than what the industry was calling for), and a promised freeze to daycare fees.
But when the challenges of the childcare industry have been ignored for so long, we need to celebrate the win, even if they aren't as big as we hoped.
In March this year childcare reform campaign Thrive by Five spearheaded a proposal for childcare fees to be slashed to $10 a day, under a plan to make it a "universal right".
They charted a path to get us there in 10 years, showing that it is a very tangible reality.
The fact that the Albanese government have today proven that they're willing to play ball, and that they are starting to follow through on their promises to move towards these goals is exciting.
For so long we've just been dealt empty promises.
This is great news for childcare educators. It's great news for women. And it's a step in the right direction for families.
This article was originally published on August 8, 2024, and has since been updated with new information.
Feature image: The Quicky/Instagram/albomp.
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