Tuesday, 2 May 2023

Kindergarten funding

Matthew BACH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (17:46): (164) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Early Childhood and Pre-Prep, who, luckily, is in the chamber tonight. Just the other day I had the opportunity to meet with a range of fabulous leaders from sessional kindergartens and other kindergartens in the electorate of Kew. I was joined by the member for Kew and also the member for Hawthorn. Now, I have a dog in this fight. President, as you know, I have a particular love of sessional kindergartens here in Victoria. The model is wonderful. The staff are overwhelmingly expert and brilliant. Many facilities are owned by councils, and there are problems with the government’s reform model when it comes to those facilities. I met with local councils a couple of weeks ago in our region, President, and they were saying that the government’s model provides no funding for capital works, but that is a different adjournment matter. Tonight the action that I would seek from the minister is for her to make changes to the government’s so-called free kinder model to ensure sessional kindergartens are not forced to make cuts to staff or existing programs.

I have heard this message before from, normally, volunteer leaders – amazing people in our community at our kindergartens – and I heard this message loud and clear from every single participant at the kinder forum that was organised by the member for Kew the other day. The ask, if you like, from these kindergarten leaders is not huge. Principally what they want, for the benefit of the minister, is greater flexibility. Of course the government wants to be able to say that its model is one of free kindergarten, but the subsidies that the government is paying do not meet what is currently being charged by many kindergartens – certainly by all the kindergartens whose leaders I met with the other day. First and foremost, what they want is some flexibility.

We know that many kindergartens at the moment are charging voluntary fees – voluntary contributions – because if they do not, they are going to have to sack existing staff and they are going to have to cut existing programs. Under the government’s model they are not allowed to charge any fees, so at the moment the government, mercifully, has provided a small one-off cash injection to allow kindergartens to continue to operate, but the understanding of these kindergartens is that that will cease to be the case next year and the year after and every single year hereafter. It is so important that we do not see a situation, which we will if there are not changes, where kindergarten teachers are sacked and where programs that are so essential for student learning are cut short. There are issues when it comes to staffing. We know that it is so hard to encourage staff to our kindergartens. There is a massive shortage. But under the government’s current model, kindergartens simply have to offer a set number of hours by a set period. They want flexibility there too, Minister, to know that if they just cannot attract staff, well, they will not be forced into this rigid model.