03 DecELAA CEO Update 3 December 2019
Read for updates on ELAA’s Federal advocacy re 15 Hours and the NQF, Victorian School Readiness Funding, and VECTEA renegotiations.
Federal Advocacy
Last week the ELAA’s Board President, Grant Boyd, and I held meetings in Canberra with Federal Minister for Education, Dan Tehan, and Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education, Amanda Rishworth.
It was highly valuable to engage in face-to-face discussions with the senior federal policy makers for our sector and ensure they are aware of the key issues concerning early childhood education providers, workers and families. The discussion with Minister Tehan was particularly enlightening, although somewhat concerning, as it would appear that the Federal Government’s position on the Commonwealth portion of Universal Access funding (“15 hours”) is potentially moving toward viewing it as the responsibility of State governments. The future funding of ACECQA beyond 30 June 2020 is also a concern to ELAA from a quality perspective.
I must stress that the Government has made no official announcement on either but I would urge members to take every opportunity to inform the families attending your services of the importance of continued commonwealth funding of “15 Hours” and maintaining the status of the National Quality Framework (and ACECQA) as the national mechanism for maintaining quality in our sector.
School Readiness Funding
Victorian based members should note that recent discussions with the Victorian Department of Education and Training (DET) regarding School Readiness Funding have identified DET’s intention not to “roll over” unspent funds from year to year. That is, unspent funds from one year will be subtracted from the following year’s School Readiness Funding payment. The rationale being that each year’s funding is supposed to be dedicated to the cohort of children in your service at that time.
Victorian Early Childhood Teachers and Educator’s Agreement
Victorian members will be pleased to know that ELAA, the Municipal Association of Victoria and the Australian Education Union have reached agreement on many matters for the next VECTEA, however, funding remains the key outstanding issue. ELAA’s position remains that changes to employment conditions can’t be made the responsibility of providers or parents to fund through, for example, increased fees.
The parties will continue to meet with DET representatives to provide updates on the negotiations and discuss how outstanding funding matters are to be addressed. We anticipate that these issues will be progressed in the first quarter of 2020 and ELAA will keep members updated.
Wishing you all a fantastic week.
David Worland
CEO – ELAA
