Wednesday, 13 August 2025

Early childhood education and care

Annabelle CLEELAND (Euroa) (16:31): I rise today to grieve for the children of Victoria because the Labor government has failed to keep them safe in child care. As a mother, I grieve for those babies ‍– the most vulnerable – who were supposed to be safe in the places we trust most. As a member of Parliament, I am angry. I am angry that the very government entrusted with protecting them has chosen delay, distraction and political self-interest over decisive action. I am angry that the warnings that were ignored continue to be ignored, and I am angry that the loopholes remain open. I am angry that parents are still being told to trust a system that has failed them time and time again.

We have entered a frightening time when the media and not the government exposes that a Victorian childcare educator who was deemed such a serious risk to children that he was formally blacklisted from the industry still to this day holds a valid working with children check. Despite this prohibition order, his card has not been revoked or suspended. This should horrify absolutely every parent and carer in this chamber. This should horrify every Victorian. This is not a loophole on paper; this is a live, dangerous failure in the very system meant to protect our children.

My grievance is with the Allan Labor government, and it is a government that has chosen politics over the protection of our children. Protecting children should never be a partisan issue. I have three beautiful children, and I believe that keeping children safe is not negotiable. It is the standard we must all be held to regardless of politics. It should be the one area in which every single member of this chamber can agree that the highest possible standard must be applied. This is not an issue that should be influenced by political advantage, and it is not about managing headlines. This should be about protecting our most vulnerable members of our community, yet here we are once again watching the Allan Labor government put politics first and safety last.

Last sitting week the Liberals and Nationals introduced urgent reforms to overhaul Victoria’s broken working with children check system, and these were reforms that would have closed loopholes, strengthened protections and put child safety first immediately. What did Labor do? They voted them down. They voted them down because once again the Premier and her team would rather protect themselves than protect Victorian children. The Worker Screening Amendment (Safety of Children) Bill 2025 was common sense, practical and immediate. That is what we need. We do not need delays. The solutions would have allowed this government to act now to enable parents to drop their children off immediately and know that they are safe. It would have strengthened the ability to revoke or refuse a working with children check, empowered assessors to consider a broader range of relevant risk factors and acted on the Victorian Ombudsman’s 2022 recommendations in full, recommendations that Labor has ignored for three long years.

Three years is a very long time in politics, but for a child in harm’s way that is an eternity, an eternity that can go on to define the rest of their life. As a parent – and there are many in this chamber who are awfully silent – I cannot comprehend why any government would knowingly leave those risks unaddressed for three whole years. The best time to implement these reforms was in 2022 when the Ombudsman first sounded the alarm, and the second-best time was last month. Labor failed to act both times, and it has resulted in devastating consequences.

One of far too many examples we have learned of recently is predator Ronald Marks in Horsham, who was convicted of accessing child abuse material and yet continued to take part in council-run activities involving children. Despite his arrest, his working with children check remained valid for years. This is broken, and urgency is needed in addressing this. When his card was eventually ruled invalid, he was still able to work alongside our children. This is not an administrative slip, it is a complete breakdown of the safeguards meant to keep our children safe. We know it.

But he is not the only one. In another disturbing case that we learned of this morning, a Victorian childcare worker deemed such a serious risk he was blacklisted was still allowed to hold a valid working with children check for years afterwards. He still has it, and we heard the silence, the 10 ‍seconds of silence from the Premier who had no idea. That is disgraceful. I hope that those members that objected to our bill last sitting week stay awake at night thinking of this. The system knew he was unsafe, but the card that gave him access to children stayed valid.

If those failures are not alarming enough, it was also revealed that the state government’s own Service Victoria app continues to have glaring security flaws. In as little as 30 seconds individuals can infiltrate another person’s working with children check to present it as their own, opening the door for dangerous individuals to work alongside kids.

In recent months everyone across our state has seen just how vulnerable our childcare sector is. Allegations of sexual abuse in Victorian childcare settings have rocked families and absolutely shattered the trust. Parents want to believe – and gosh, they should, they deserve it – that when they drop their child off in the morning they are safe. They want to believe that the system which screens staff and protects our youngest is watertight, but it is not, and Labor knows this. Every member on the opposite side, you know this. They have known it since 2022, but instead of acting, they have chosen a so-called rapid review, a rapid review that is three years too late. A review is not a protection; a review is not real reform; a review is a political tactic to buy time, to manage headlines and to avoid accountability. But let me be clear: every single Victorian deserves to know exactly who voted to keep this broken system in place, and the heartbreaking fact is that it was not some faceless bureaucrat. It was 54 Labor members of the Legislative Assembly, led by the Premier of Victoria, who each made a conscious decision to block these reforms.

I want to acknowledge the amazing work of the member for Kew Jess Wilson, who has acted swiftly and decisively to propose these reforms immediately – reforms that could have given parents across Victoria peace of mind that their children were safe. These effective and meaningful reforms were not the only thing that Labor ignored. We know they have form in this. They ignored the Ombudsman report from three years ago. Three years – so much has happened in that time that could have been avoided. They failed to act on clear and urgent warnings, and there are so many families whose future has been shattered because of that. They allowed dangerous gaps in the system to remain open for three years and continue to this day – to this minute – to remain open. When given the chance to close this gap, 54 members voted no, and the result we are left with is a system that still allows people under investigation for serious child-related offences to hold a working with children check.

This is a system where key risk factors are ignored because the law does not require them to be considered. It is a system where parents are expected to place trust in a process that has failed them again and again, and tomorrow it will fail them and every day after until the government decides to act. But we have given them the directive; we have given them the solution.

To every single Victorian parent: I want you to know that when the moment came to choose between safeguarding Victorian children and safeguarding themselves, Labor chose themselves. As a mother, I will not forget. As a mother, I find this choice absolutely beyond comprehension.

This government’s failures do not end with screening checks. Access to child care remains a serious issue across the state, and it is critical to the wellbeing and safety of Victorian children. Right now families across Victoria, and in particular regional Victoria, are desperate for child care, and without access to safe, regulated child care parents are forced to make impossible choices: to give up work, to put their careers on hold or worse, to place their children in unregulated settings where there are no safeguards whatsoever. The government promised to fix it, but we are still waiting.

In August 2023 they proudly announced 50 new childcare facilities by 2028 – glossy press release, all the bells and whistles, smiley faces, big promises. By May last year the timeline had quietly blown out to 2032, and as it stands, just four of these centres will open by the end of the year and 26 of the promised 50 have no timeline for completion at all. This is not delay; this is complete abandonment. The language has changed. These proposed centres represent 26 towns and suburbs where parents had pinned their hopes on improved childcare access, 26 communities where parents are trying to return to work, ease cost-of-living pressures and give their child the best possible start to life, only to be told to wait several years.

The government boasts about $14 billion in early childhood education, but that is a mere promise that they are breaking rapidly. $14 billion means nothing if the promises are broken and the facilities are never delivered. It means nothing if those facilities are not safe. And while access is part of the problem, enforcement and regulations keep us awake on this side of the house. Labor’s own childcare regulator, the Department of Education’s quality assessment and regulation division, is failing to do its job. Since 2016 the regulator has sanctioned 11 of G8 Education’s 130 centres. Complaints continue to go up, but enforcement is absolutely down. And despite these failings, Labor’s rapid review into childcare safety is deliberately designed to exclude the examination of the regulator’s performance. It is failing. They will not even look at whether the watchdog is effective.

Victorians can see through this delay tactic, because this is not oversight, it is avoidance. Right now the regulator is a watchdog without teeth and Victorian families and Victorian children are paying the price. We owe Victorian children more than this. We owe Victorian parents more than this. As a mother, I know we owe our communities the truth. This government had chance after chance, year after year to act, and it has chosen delay, distraction and political self-interest. The best time to fix this was three years ago. The second-best time to fix this was last month. The Allan Labor government chose neither. Let me tell you, Victorian families will not forget this. This is not good enough. Our children deserve a system that puts their safety before politics. Parents deserve a government that tells them the truth, not one that hides behind reviews or media. The safety of our children is not negotiable ‍– not for me, not for the Liberals and Nationals and not for every parent in Victoria.