Wednesday, 30 July 2025

Motions

Ombudsman referral

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (10:47): I move:

That this house:

(1) notes with concern the allegations of child sexual abuse by a Melbourne childcare worker, the significant impact on affected families, and the testing of over 2000 children following the individual’s employment across at least 24 centres;

(2) further notes that:

(a) Victoria’s working with children check system was identified in a 2022 Ombudsman report, Investigation into a Former Youth Worker’s Unauthorised Access to Private Information about Children, as among the weakest in the nation, and recommendations for urgent reform have not been implemented;

(b) there is an absence of mandatory training for working with children check applicants and a lack of a centralised register of childcare educators to support effective oversight;

(c) the quality assessment and regulation division (QARD) responsible for regulating early childhood services has recorded a 45 per cent increase in complaints and a 67 per cent decline in enforcement action since 2018;

(3) observes that QARD was excluded from the rapid child safety review announced by the government;

(4) pursuant to section 16 of the Ombudsman Act 1973, refers the following matters to the Ombudsman for investigation and report:

(a) the performance of QARD in monitoring, investigating, and enforcing compliance with Victoria’s child safe standards and the national quality framework; and

(b) any failure to comply with applicable laws, policies, or codes in relation to its regulatory role.

I am pleased to be able to rise and speak to motion 989 because it is dealing with a very significant issue that we have already been discussing in the Parliament this morning. But more broadly, it is being discussed right across the community and has been for some weeks following the very alarming and concerning allegations that have occurred within our early childhood education and childcare settings. I say that because what has occurred has clearly exposed monumental failures within the system. After the government was warned about those gaps in the system and the failures within the system they failed to act, and this has led to some very catastrophic findings, as we have been reading in the papers and hearing about and understanding.

This motion that the Liberals and Nationals have put forward is a referral to the Ombudsman to look into this matter, and I want to just go through the motion and speak to it, because there have been, as I said, failings by government, and it is incredibly important that we have an independent investigation into those issues. As I said, as we have been hearing through the debate that has been going on this morning with what has already been moved around a documents motion, this is an extremely serious matter.

If I can just go to the point around the 2022 Ombudsman report, in that report there were serious flaws identified in the Victorian working with children check scheme. The Ombudsman’s investigation into a youth worker’s access to Victorian government information about children and young people exposed the shortfalls in the working with children scheme, and it is very much highlighted in that report. What the Ombudsman found was that Victoria’s screening authority was one of the most limited in Australia and that there needed to be legislation to come in line and do more. In tabling the report the Ombudsman called on the Attorney-General and the Department of Justice and Community Safety, which administers the working with children check scheme, to consider much-needed amendments to Victoria’s child safety screening laws to ensure Working with Children Check Victoria is able to consider all relevant information relating to a person’s risk to children. So it is very much around what the findings around the safety aspects for children were.

In that report, in that investigation, the Ombudsman said:

… the inadequacies in Victoria’s child safety screening legislation mean that these prior investigations would not have been grounds to refuse –

the worker that was identified –

… a Working with Children clearance, even if the screening authority had been aware of them.

So there were massive gaps, and the government was called upon to fix them. Ms Glass, the Ombudsman at the time, said:

Some painful lessons have been learnt. For the safety of our children, more needs to be done.

That plea and that call on the government to do more was ignored. At the time the Shadow Attorney-General Michael O’Brien pointed out just how significant this report was and the dangers. In September 2022 in a media release around this report he said, not forgetting that there had been calls to look at the working with children check – and I have to refer back to the child abuse inquiry that I was chair of, Betrayal of Trust, when we referenced the working with children check in that important inquiry and looked at the scheme:

… after eight years of the Andrews Labor Government, Victoria has the weakest Working With Children safeguards in the nation.

‘The Ombudsman has exposed that Labor’s poor legislation has created loopholes that only benefits pedophiles and those who would exploit children.’

We took to the election at that time that we would immediately fix this problem and strengthen the Worker Screening Act 2020 to implement stronger reforms. That is the history of what we are talking about here, where the government has continually failed to undertake their responsibility in looking at this very important area. They get up and they spruik every day that they are here to protect the community, and they have failed on multiple points in that area. But in this area, when you come into this house and you hear the minister not taking responsibility for her own area, it is unbelievably galling.

I want to go to that because in this motion it talks about the quality assessment and regulation division, QARD, which is responsible for regulating early childhood services. This is what the minister has responsibility for. She is clearly responsible for this area, even though the government has got a massive protection racket going on. In relation to her responsibility, she has abrogated all responsibility in this.

The Department of Education talks about the regulatory role for early childhood services in Victoria under a number of regulatory schemes, including the Education and Care Services National Law Act 2010, the education and care services national regulations – they are the national quality framework and national quality standard – and the Victorian children’s services regulatory scheme, the Children’s Services Act 1996, the Children’s Services Regulations 2020 and regulation of the child safe standards. These are very clearly in her remit.

The Secretary of the Department of Education delegates the functions and powers of the regulatory authority to the quality assessment and regulation division required to administer and enforce the law and regulations. QARD undertakes the full range of functions and powers provided to the regulatory authority under all three schemes to promote the safety, health and wellbeing of children attending early childhood services in Victoria. In the statement of expectations (SOE) around this important area the minister’s responsibilities are very clearly laid out, but when she is questioned she refuses to acknowledge that she has any responsibility in this area at all. Well, her own letter to the secretary clearly points out that she has this responsibility. I want to read from that statement of expectations, because it is incredibly important to understand. While I think the minister has abrogated all her responsibility, she has clearly failed as the Minister for Children. This is in this statement of expectations, the letter to the secretary from the minister says:

As Minister for Children, I am responsible for administering the Education and Care Services National Law Act 2010 and the Children’s Services Act 1996. This SOE should be read in the context of the objectives, obligations and functions outlined in these Acts which make the safety, health and wellbeing of children attending high quality early childhood education and care services paramount.

These are the minister’s own words. It goes on:

I note that QARD is also the integrated sector regulator for the Child Safe Standards, made under the Child Wellbeing and Safety Act 2005, as they apply to early childhood education and care services operating in Victoria.

This SOE outlines key governance and performance objectives aimed at improving the regulation of early childhood education and care services. In setting out these expectations, I acknowledge the important role of QARD in supporting the government’s Best Start, Best Life reforms.

The statement of expectation goes on to say:

Emerging risks and priorities

Ensuring the safety, health and wellbeing of children attending early childhood services and improving their educational and developmental outcomes is core to Victoria’s ambition to provide a great education for every child and young person.

… QARD plays an important role in ensuring that Victorian children attending early childhood education and care services are safe from harm and abuse.

…

Based on the government’s priorities and emerging risks, and in line with good regulatory practice, my expectations for QARD are as follows –

and here are the priorities and that the minister highlights to the department secretary –

Ensure the QARD regulatory regime is fit-for-purpose

Target regulatory effort based on risk of harm

Support duty holders to comply with their obligations

Be transparent and accountable for activities performed

Continuously improve QARD’s regulatory operations

Support duty holders to understand the value of compliance and harm reduction

In the expectation component of this priority it says:

Work closely with other Victorian regulatory partners on child safety and protection.

…

Support adherence to the Child Safe Standards in early childhood services by:

• educating and guiding services about compliance with the Child Safe Standards

• monitoring service compliance with the Child Safe Standards and taking appropriate steps to address non-compliance, as the integrated regulator for the early childhood sector.

Now, as you saw, the minister stated herself that they work in partnership and that she has responsibility. Yet when she is questioned in this place, there is no responsibility and she just handballs it to everybody else, saying ‘nothing to do with me’. This is a shameful failure on behalf of the government and on behalf of the minister in her role around the protection of children and childcare safety. There are clearly massive failures in this, and that is why it is extraordinary that in the government’s own review that they are doing QARD is not even mentioned. The scope of the review and the terms of reference talk about identifying:

… the immediate actions the Victorian Government can take to improve the safety of children in early childhood education and care settings –

and it goes down –

including but not limited to …

various things.

The Liberals and Nationals introduced a bill into the Parliament yesterday. That was immediate action that could have been implemented. But shamefully, the government voted against it. They voted against the protection of children, taking immediate action to protect children – another shameful act by this government. They are ignoring their own failures. And what that bill did, what the shadow minister Jess Wilson did, was explicitly show where the failures are. She outlined the plan about how it could be fixed, and yet the government shamefully voted it down.

This rapid child safety review that the government is spruiking does not even go to the very element around QARD, the regulatory component. It says in the scope of the review:

identify options to improve interactions between regulatory schemes …

But it does not even involve QARD. It looks at other areas around the national quality framework, the New South Wales Early Childhood Education and Care Regulatory Authority, the Queensland Family and Child Commission and the Victorian Ombudsman’s report that was tabled in 2022 and yet the government failed to act on it. I mean, this is extraordinary. These failures of the government and the minister’s abrogation of her responsibilities in this really important area are so clear for everyone to see. This is a catastrophic failure of government in undertaking the important role that they have in having proper systems in place when they are alerted.

We saw in an article today that when a young worker highlighted to the regulator that they were concerned about what was going on, they were told that following a review from the department no further action would be taken. And yet the Department of Education has refused to respond to questions around that. This is extraordinary. I want to just say, in relation to the compliance issues around the 45 per cent increase in complaints and a 67 per cent decline in enforcement action since 2018, extraordinarily in 2018 one in 20 complaints had an enforcement action and in 2023 just one in 88 complaints had an enforcement action. That is a clear failure of the system, and that is why we are moving this motion today to have the Ombudsman look at this issue again. It is because we need to have independence, because when complaints are being put forward to the department, the department is saying ‘nothing to see here’. When it is exposed, like these horrific allegations have been exposed over recent weeks, the government is doing an internal review, and they are not even including the very element that needs to be looked at, QARD, the regulatory system which is failing on every front.

This is a shameful period for this government, for their failings of not taking this issue seriously, for just paying lip-service, for deflecting any concerns around the issues that have been raised for years, for the failure to act and for the failure to protect children. If anything, government have a responsibility for safety for the community and for vulnerable children. We need to rebuild trust. So many parents that I have spoken to – and I know that my colleagues have spoken to parents; they are parents themselves – need to have trust back in the system, and that trust has been broken. And it is not just parents of young children, it is family members and it is grandparents. It is everybody involved with those children that are put into these childcare settings. And those workers that work in it, who are doing a tremendous job, also want trust in the system. They want to know, like that young worker who reported their concerns to the department, that they have been acted upon, not brushed off, saying, ‘Nothing to see here.’ ‘Nothing to see here’ has led to these catastrophic failures and the huge issues that we are now dealing with.

This government has failed. It has failed every single Victorian in this very important area. It is critical that we do more and that the Parliament does more, and that is why we have brought this motion to the Parliament. It is why the Liberals and Nationals did not write directly to the Ombudsman to do this. The Parliament needs to do this. The Parliament needs to show the support and understand that there are failures in the system that have led to these catastrophic loopholes, which have gone unclosed for years – and they are catastrophic loopholes that should have been closed, should have been identified, because now we have got thousands of children affected and thousands of families affected, and these parents and children deserve much better from a government which has failed at every level.

The lip-service is not enough. Action is required. They have failed for years. They were warned years ago, and now we have got children who have been subjected to the most horrific – allegedly, I should say – crimes. Let the investigators do their job on that bit. But what the Parliament can do is look at the framework and have the Ombudsman look at this, have a comprehensive review into it, because the government’s review is not comprehensive; it is cherrypicking items. I urge all members to support this motion in the interests of all children.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (11:07): All Victorians are sickened by these allegations – all of us as parents, as grandparents and as future parents, and also anybody who was in childcare themselves; you might be an adult now but have experienced child care. We know that families must be able to trust the care of their children and that all settings are safe, and our government will do everything in our power to ensure that they can.

As there is a police investigation underway, I will be cautious about the language that I use in this particular speech. This is also a deeply distressing subject. We have a range of supports as a government in place for all impacted families, and I urge them to visit the vic.gov.au website. You will be able to navigate that very directly.

Let us have a look at the history of the childcare sector over the last 50 years. The sector has fundamentally shifted from a not-for-profit and local government run model to there now being an acceleration into for-profit care. This policy was driven substantially under the Howard government. There is strong and consistent evidence that the institutional environment is a key factor in the likelihood of abuse occurring, and that is certainly something that I know about. As a former sexual assault counsellor, many of the women and men that came to me for counselling experienced their abuse in institutional environments. Abuse risks are amplified or reduced depending on how organisations are run – how they are structured, how they are administrated – their accountability and importantly the culture that exists.

In privatised child care these risks can be amplified when a profit-driven model puts business interests ahead of children’s safety. A concern for costs can mean poor staff training, weak screening and understaffing. In the United Workers Union early childhood education and care quality and safety census, most educators reported that this understaffing is putting children at risk, 77 per cent of educators said they are operating below minimum staffing requirements at least weekly and 42 per cent said it is happening daily. Because it will impact the bottom line, warning signs may be ignored, complaints may be silenced and survivors might not be believed. A lack of job security and a profit-driven culture can make it hard for junior staff to raise concerns, and this is certainly the issue in any institution for junior staff.

We know that the ABC reported on 18 June that a recent survey of New South Wales educators revealed that over one-third of respondents had avoided reporting serious child safety concerns for fear of retaliation. Others reported being penalised after raising legitimate issues. The Australian Education Union early childhood vice-president Cara Nightingale made this point well in an AEU press release on 9 July:

Right now, in too many for-profit early childhood businesses, management creates atmospheres where speaking out is not possible and where silence is expected of workers.

…

High quality early years education can’t be about business interests and profit margins.

I thoroughly support or agree with those sentiments. Our children, along with our aged, are the most vulnerable members of our community.

It is a matter for the Commonwealth government as to whether they will use the childcare subsidy to prioritise the growth of not-for-profit providers of child care. In Victoria we have used the policy levers available to us through the establishment of 50 government owned and operated early learning centres, and in this chamber we have had multiple contributions on the success of these. I was at one of the first openings earlier this year or late last year; I cannot remember. It is a brilliant model, and it is an example of the Victorian government responding to shortages of child care in our state even though this is a federal area of responsibility.

The hypocrisy from those opposite is breathtaking. Over the break the coalition have criticised our rapid review into child safety that will report in about two weeks, but today they want to initiate a separate review that will provide a final report in 12 months. The coalition has also stated that they want the Victorian Institute of Teaching to regulate early childhood workers, but last year it said that there needs to be an independent audit into the VIT and described it as a failed regulator. They have no credibility in this space. They are all over the place. The coalition have moved from supporting a review to criticising our child safety review to then releasing a glossy document with no substance – and today they want a different review.

They are, in my view, all over the place on this matter. We saw in question time yesterday that they cannot even figure out how to address questions to the Minister for Children that are actually relevant to her portfolio. It was actually the Greens who were able to ask an appropriate question yesterday, before the coalition got some semblance of their act together. This is the result of playing politics with child safety. I do want to express my caution for everybody who contributes on this issue in this chamber. Each contributor – all of us – should consider carefully the current and future rights of children who are currently in child care in these childcare centres. If personal details are mentioned in this chamber, it can cut across the right of parents to inform their children as they see fit and in a manner that supports the unique needs of their child. I think we all want to absolutely look into what has been going on here – what the strengths and weaknesses of our current systems are – but not to play politics with children’s personal experiences.

Child care is regulated under a national framework – and this is important – but we are acting where we can as a state. Work has been underway at a national level to ban personal devices, and many centres have already started to informally do that. We are also establishing a register of early childhood educators and using established systems to take immediate steps – it warms my heart to hear that – to build a register of early childhood educators, and this will be established by late August. This phase is expected to capture information on over 90 per cent of employees. Registration began last week, and we have already got 3456 workers. There are a number of other longer term solutions.

I want to close by saying that it is very important that we get to the bottom of the issues that have come up here, including the work on working with children. I want to say thank you to Minister Lizzie Blandthorn for the work she has been doing. She is absolutely all over what has been going on, and I am looking forward to her leadership on this issue.

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (11:18): The contribution we have just heard today I think is from the socialist republic of the Labor government, and it would seem that all private industry, all private business and all private childcare centres are indeed part of the abomination of an industry. I reject that point and I also reject the government member just now speaking about a ‘rapid review’ – a ‘rapid review’ that has taken three years to come to fruition; a ‘rapid review’ that is not serving the most vulnerable of Victorians, our children. I stand here to support our Liberal and National motion for a referral to the Victorian Ombudsman of this very important issue to the quality assessment and regulation division – QARD, as I will refer to it.

This government is world class in finger pointing: ‘Look over there, but don’t look in the mirror.’ It is atrocious that we have seen some shocking allegations of child sexual abuse at a number of childcare centres presented to the Victorian public and the government is still obfuscating its responsibility. It is still not looking at actions to close dangerous loopholes after the Victorian Ombudsman Deborah Glass, back in 2022, laid out very clearly a pathway forward to reform this system. This government has completely, unacceptably not looked in the mirror. It is unacceptable that enforcement actions have declined while complaints have increased. Parents deserve confidence. I take up Ms Crozier’s very apt point in her speech about the lack of trust that parents, children and families have in this system, and it is not fair on those who work in the system as well. They deserve to know that they are coming and the work that they do supports families, Victorian prosperity and the economy to grow children safely so that parents can go about their business and work. They need that trust, they need that safety, and this government is obfuscating its responsibility. Indeed we know that, very shockingly, an alleged perpetrator is now looking at 70 charges after having worked in the system for eight years and being allegedly employed across 23 childcare centres. The devastation that that is causing those families and those children is simply unfair.

The government introduced child safe standards in 2006, and I have spoken on this a number of times in relation to the disability sector. Many in that sector feel that this is a policy statement rather than an embedded action in all of the areas of education – in this case, child care and nurturing environments. We see also that the quality assessment and regulation division, QARD, is a division of the Department of Education, yet this government’s own investigation – ‘rapid review’, as we have heard it called – is not looking at its own homework. It is not looking at its internal department. You cannot stand up here and hand on heart say you are making a difference if you are not going to investigate some of the issues around regulation and safeguarding frameworks. It is just an abomination.

We saw that the Victorian Ombudsman – I had the pleasure nine years ago of meeting Deborah Glass – acted without fear or favour. I think she viewed all members of Parliament with scepticism, and we took that on board, because her role was about finding out the truth and delivering comment to government and recommendations to government – and boy, did she find out some things back in 2022 in the review of working with children checks. Certainly she exposed that the system had serious flaws in the way it was managed, particularly around information sharing and revocation delays. Her findings included that there was limited access to intelligence and that Working with Children Checks Victoria could not access interstate child protection reports, intervention orders or unprosecuted allegations. The system relied almost exclusively on criminal charges, so it had to get to a point where the police were called in and there were, as we have seen, criminal charges laid before there was serious consideration. We saw from the Ombudsman the recommendations that she made to expand the powers of Working with Children Checks Victoria. She stated that they were some of the worst in the nation. Her foreword from that report indicates that Victoria’s working with children’s check laws are ‘among the most limited in Australia’. They do not allow consideration of child protection reports or other relevant information unless it results in a criminal charge.

This just highlights how flawed the system was and still is three years later – and the government is calling it a rapid review. The Ombudsman also spoke about improved interagency coordination between police, child protection services and employees. It also called for faster response times and stronger oversight of high-risk individuals. We have seen those individuals in the most alarming and concerning way for our children. What the government needs to look at it is why it is actually doing an internal review without looking at QARD. It is just mind-boggling that it thinks that is acceptable.

What have we seen from the Liberals and Nationals? I put on record my thanks to our Shadow Minister for Education and Shadow Attorney-General for the depth of thorough work they have done and not only that but coming up with solutions for this situation for very vulnerable people. I will not mention other than briefly my thoughts around this as I am a new grandmother and my grandchild is not in this state – I might have to say on this case that it is sad for me – but the system in New South Wales is far stronger in relation to this. Those children are the most precious resource we have in our nation, and they deserve the maximum amount of protection and safeguarding, which this government has not implemented.

In relation to our Worker Screening Amendment (Safety of Children) Bill 2025, which we put forward in the lower house and which the Premier decided to reject, we tabled it and first read it today. We are going to then put it on the notice paper for debate as a private member’s bill for the Liberals and Nationals, for the whole of the state, and this house should be looking to adopt it. I also thank, in this case, the Greens for their consideration. They have got a motion up ahead that needs to be dealt with in a positive fashion by this house. It is important that we strengthen this. It is important that there be expanded grounds for refusal of working with children. It is important that there is law enforcement integration. It is important that there is a shortened validity period. We were going to reduce that for people working in the industry – not for those who volunteer at their netball club – to three years, because a lot can happen in five years. It is important that there be mandatory training and that applicants must complete online mandatory training on child sexual abuse and other forms. This is the sort of rigour that the Liberals and Nationals want to put in. We understand that trust in the system has been broken.

We understand that rather than taking an apolitical, focused point of view and having an independent understanding, we are putting this forward for the Ombudsman. In actual fact I have worked for almost a decade in the education sector. I have worked with fantastic kids and with fantastic teachers in the state sector, but it is not immune. It is not just the private schools or the private childcare centres that have these types of allegations and types of incidents and types of concerns. There are many people that I have spoken to in my time here about our education sector, and we did an inquiry into the education system that threw up a lot of alarm bells across the board. We want to ensure that our children are learning, our children are safe and our children are nurtured, and this government is obfuscating its responsibility. What this government is doing over this case is political issue management versus child safety. This government is looking to mitigate that fallout rather than embrace child safety. If it did, it would have acted on the Ombudsman’s report three years ago. If it did, it would have included the QARD in its inquiry.

Anasina GRAY-BARBERIO (Northern Metropolitan) (11:28): I rise to speak on motion 989 raised by the opposition for an Ombudsman referral of the quality assessment and regulation division’s oversight of the early childhood services. The early childhood education and care sector is not just in crisis at the moment, it is in a downward spiral. Serious allegations of ongoing abuse in childcare settings and a clear systemic issue in the sector have been uncovered and have left so many families, educators and the Victorian public completely distressed and asking questions of ‘How?’ How could this be, with a regulator, with working with children checks and plenty of schemes and systems that should have been working and functioning well to protect their children? Now more than ever Victorian parents deserve to know that this government, through its regulator and through its department functions, is prioritising the safety of children in the sector. No more words, no more pledges and no more standing in front of podiums saying that they are going to do everything to fix this crisis. What the Victorian public is calling for is action – action that will protect their children when they are dropping them off at early childcare centres every morning.

As it stands, the current structure allows the government to mark its own homework when it comes to child safety, and this is not a sustainable or effective system. Unfortunately, as we have seen in recent weeks, it has allowed for the most horrific of tragedies to take place. An independent, clear-eyed investigation is crucial to finding gaps and holes in the system, giving transparency to Victorian parents and the community and holding every part of this sector to account, starting with the government. We must do everything in our power. We must pull every lever we can to ensure tragedies like this can never happen again and ensure children’s safety is at the highest of standards.

The Ombudsman is well placed to lead such an investigation. It operates independently of the government, and in this crisis, where the government is missing deadlines to produce documents and be transparent, the need for impartiality is very strong. It also has the power to investigate ongoing systemic issues in government departments, something that is sorely needed in this current situation, where this government is so obsessed with secrecy. Let me be clear: this is the first of many steps that Parliament must take to rebuild confidence with parents, educators and the Victorian public.

The quality assessment and regulation division, QARD, sits within the Department of Education. I have heard quite frequently mentioned that early childhood care is regulated at the national level, which is true, but this insistence on kicking the can down the road against the backdrop of what is one of the most horrific cases of child sexual abuse is a redaction of responsibility by this government. Recent revelations have made it clear that oversight and transparency must be urgently reviewed. When the same department that is responsible for delivering early childhood services is also regulating them, it creates a clear conflict of interest and makes it harder to hold the system accountable when things go wrong.

We have heard across many media outlets of the failures of QARD to investigate, and the Greens have been denied access to other documents which we requested through this Parliament that were related to how QARD is regulating and monitoring the early childhood care system pertaining to issues like compliance, risk assessments, enforcement notices and emergency notices. We have been denied access to these documents which are well and truly clearly in the public interest.

Implementing training to gain a working with children check is a very useful tool to protect our children and for creating safer environments for children and their care. The Greens welcome the opportunity to work collaboratively with parties across the political spectrum for the safety of our babies, our toddlers and our children. The Greens will be supporting this motion today, and I commend this motion to the house.

Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (11:33): All Victorians have been impacted by the news that we have heard in recent weeks, and I particularly want to start by acknowledging all families – those within the sphere of what has been reported and obviously those directly impacted. I think there are many, many families that have used centres or been in the sphere of the allegations, and for them I just want to note it would have been a particularly traumatic time. For those families that have been confirmed to have been directly impacted, I think it is important to ensure that they are taking all supports available, both financial supports and supports for them to process and deal with this situation.

Having grown up and lived in Ballarat, I have seen the generational trauma that has occurred there. I spoke about this in my first speech – the impacts on the individuals who were directly involved in these sorts of scenarios, and the families, and indeed what flowed on out into the community. The mental health knock-ons, when not addressed, which of course happened in that situation and many other towns and cities around not only Australia but the world, result in the mental ill health, the alcohol abuse, the drug abuse and then of course, very sadly, and as I experienced with work colleagues and other people, the suicides that follow. So I just want to acknowledge what has no doubt been a very traumatic time for very many families and their friends, their circles and their connections – lean into the supports available – and also the workers in those centres.

Victorian families must be able to feel safe and secure in the knowledge that their children are safe, and we need to do everything in our power to ensure that this is the case. The government has commissioned an urgent review into child safety in early childhood education and care settings and the working with children check in Victoria, which will be led by Jay Weatherill AO and Pamela White PSM, and the government will adopt every recommendation. This is due to be handed down by Friday 15 August in a number of weeks time. We are using established systems to take immediate steps to build a register of early childhood educators. This will be established in late August. Other solutions will be able to link into a national registration system once it is established. We are also taking urgent action to stop the use of personal devices in childcare centres, with every centre required to adopt a ban on personal devices by Friday 26 September.

There are state and federal reviews underway. The changes that we make because of these reviews need to be targeted and effective, and we need to get these changes right and do so in a quick manner. Getting these changes right and getting this system working well so families are secure in the knowledge of their children’s safety is so important because of how important childcare and early education are. I have said in this place before that when I entered this role I did not have the appreciation and the deep respect for early education that I do now and the understanding of just how important it is to the development of our children that whether they are in day care or we are talking about kindergarten they are getting the best possible start to those formative years of their lives. For all of us, it is so beneficial – for the individual, for the family, for the community and for us all as a society to prosper. That investment early in each and every one of these individuals is so valuable, and when ensuring that these individuals are not only learning and socialising and making happy, healthy connections to others and stimulating their minds, obviously, they absolutely have to be safe, because we cannot have children going into a space where they are meant to be forming to the absolute best of their ability and leaving that situation with potential trauma.

I think that the relationships – and I heard Jason Clare talking about this – that children form with some of their carers can be some of the most important relationships in their lives. It is such rich work that our carers and early educators do. We want to ensure that as families and a society we feel comfortable with the settings and the framework that is there so that all of the workers who do such incredible work for our youngsters can get on and do so with families feeling comfortable but also that the workforce feel comfortable that the regulations are right and the framework is right for them to be able to focus on what is important, which is connecting with, caring for and educating our kids. When all that is right, our kids can socialise early and they can develop and get ready for their next steps in education – and we have had really positive news come out about our NAPLAN results here in Victoria. I think by getting all these settings right we are going to see benefits for generations to come, not just socially but also in the economic capacity of our state. And of course we have got the workforce participation with parents being able to get back to work, but they cannot do that if they are not feeling confident in the care that their children are receiving.

I think I have summed up my thoughts and feelings, but I just acknowledge the workforce that do incredible work and care for our kids. I just stress again that the work that is going on will need to be implemented and implemented quickly, and to ensure that we get all recommendations and all findings implemented correctly so that families can be secure to be at work and for their young ones to be being educated in a safe and secure environment. I will leave my comments there.

Trung LUU (Western Metropolitan) (11:41): I rise to speak on this motion on the horrific childcare failure that occurred under this government’s watch, and I do so not just as a local member where so many of the alleged sex abuse incidents reportedly occurred but also as the father of five young children. I am deeply concerned that this system is failing our families and our most vulnerable Victorians – that is, our children. I, like many of my constituents, have been shocked at the extent of the alleged abuse that occurred and can only imagine what these families are going through right now. Can I begin my contribution by acknowledging the distress and hurt to these families experiencing this right now and to those directly and indirectly impacted. I can only say I empathise with these families at a time like now.

This motion is calling on the Ombudsman to investigate and report on these systemic failings. It is imperative and it is timely. I cannot believe it is 2000 young children – that is 2000 young children – who need to be tested for sexually transmitted infection. It is unthinkable, something you can never imagine would occur, let alone in Victoria. And these innocent children are being subjected to this ordeal simply for attending childcare centres. This is not a failure of any one individual or even a manager of a centre or the staff of the centre and their oversight of children, it is a systemic failure of a system that is there to protect our children. We need to go through and look at what went wrong with a fine-tooth comb, leaving no stone unturned, with an investigation by the Ombudsman. We must get to the bottom of the performance of the quality assessment and regulation division, which is responsible for the regulation of these childhood centre services. We need to know what their response was to the monitoring, investigating and enforcing of compliance with Victoria’s child safe standards and the national quality framework.

Since this allegation of child sex abuse has come to light in my electorate, residents and parents across Melbourne’s west have rightly been concerned. Many do not know where to turn and what services and support are available. I have been thankful that organisations including the WestCASA, the Western Region Centre Against Sexual Assault based in Melbourne’s west, are responding with acute tailored support for people needing a service to help them get through this truly traumatic time. I have personally liaised with the WestCASA community engagement team in light of these incidents in my electorate. They have been very forthcoming with support. I urge my constituents listening to this debate to reach out to WestCASA for support if you need it or if you are unsure or concerned about your family.

To learn that at least 24 centres are impacted by these allegations – as I mentioned, many are in my electorate, including Point Cook, Werribee, Truganina, Footscray, Braybrook, Tarneit, Wyndham Vale, Keilor, Sunbury, Hoppers Crossing and Williamstown – is simply devastating. So many children, so many families and so many staff have been distressed by this. How many of these centres are tied up in this ordeal, this failure of this government?

What is alarming and quite frankly inexcusable is that Victorian working with children checks were identified by the Ombudsman’s report released in September 2022 as being the weakest in the nation, with recommendations urging reform. In other words, alarm bells were ringing and no-one was paying attention, one of which was to extend the basis upon which working with children checks can be provided or refused and empower the assessor to take into account a broad range of relevant information and risk factors when determining an applicant’s suitability. These reforms remain unfulfilled by this Allan Labor government. These reforms need to be urgently implemented now, given that they have already been delayed by three years under this Labor government.

Thankfully, not only has my hardworking Shadow Minister for Education outlined what is going on, but also we have noted down the changes that can be made to help those families and children right now. Things need to be fixed with working with children checks, allowing assessors to act on red flags, not just on criminal charges and convictions. It is things like empowering parents and giving them the right to know. Currently this information is being withheld. Why – I do not know. It is things like raising the bar of working standards, extending mandatory safety training to cert 3 or diploma qualifications. It is things like creating independent childcare safety watchdogs. Let us create an independent statutory authority right now to separate the regulator from where it is currently sitting within the Department of Education. These changes are vitally important and are needed to restore the trust of thousands of Victorians whose trust has been shattered.

Also, I want to quickly speak in relation to the ramping up of training provision of working with children applications. It is unbelievable that these days you can just apply for a working with children check and not undergo any formal training to obtain the certificate. If I am going to pay someone to watch my kids, I need to know they have had some sort of training. Compare this to obtaining certificates in hospitality just to pour a beer or working with the elderly in aged care, who all must go through mandatory training, and rightly so.

Alarmingly, the quality assessment and regulatory division, which is responsible for regulating early childhood services, has recorded a 45 per cent increase in complaints, coupled with a 67 per cent decline in enforcement actions since 2018. This division was for some reason excluded from the government’s so-called rapid review into child safety in early education. If you are going to look at something, you look at every single thing and do not cherrypick what you want to pick. The same review is being led by the former Labor Premier of South Australia Jay Weatherill. Why are they left out in the review? Given all the experience in managing compliance and enforcement, why would the government exclude them from the timely review? It is another ‘Nothing to see here’; it is another ‘I cannot recall what has happened’ or blame-shifting. I would urge the government to reconsider this and work this division in as part as their review.

If you want to know what is happening and you want to improve and make sure safety occurs for our children, now is not the time for the government to avoid scrutiny. It is a matter of priority that we have safety for our children. Now is the time to get to the bottom of this debacle which has caused dreadful distress to thousands of families, thousands of children, most of whom are in my electorate, and put an end to what has been a truly traumatic chapter in this state’s early childcare sector. It is unforgivable if we do not turn every stone and make sure every investigation is looked at.

I wholeheartedly support this motion to refer it to the Ombudsman, and I thank those who have brought this motion to this chamber for debate and respectful discussion. It is important that we make sure every part is being looked at carefully to ensure that we can move forward and make sure our kids are safe when put under the care of someone else.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (11:20): I rise to speak on the quality assessment and regulatory division performance in Victorian childcare standards, which in light of the horrific allegations of child abuse by an individual actor is an incredibly important matter for us to take up and talk about. I will speak on what we are doing to stamp out any potential for abuse in childcare centres, because what we have seen and heard over the past few weeks has been absolutely horrific. My heart goes out to the countless families and communities affected by these allegations. I can confidently say that everybody in this chamber today is still feeling completely sickened by these events.

We know that families must be able to trust that their children are safe in these settings. The work has been done nationally to strengthen child safety measures in childcare and early education centres, and while their work speaks for itself, I would like to commend the Albanese government for their decisive action on the matter. The Allan Labor government is working to strengthen child safety standards here in Victoria and bring them in line with other states nationally. Child care is regulated under the national framework, and this is important, but we are acting where we can. Work has been underway at a national level to ban personal devices in child care. Here in Victoria, the ban on personal devices will take place by Friday 26 September. While the majority of childcare workers and providers are doing the right thing by our young Victorian children, even a single bad actor is completely unacceptable.

Today I would like to speak about what our government is doing to stop this from ever happening again, because everywhere, but especially in early childhood care, families should be able to trust that their children are being kept safe from harm. Through this work we are reviewing and strengthening our regulatory bodies and frameworks and, in turn, the quality assessment and regulatory division’s performance. This is at the forefront of the Allan Labor government’s review into childcare operations. Under national law, approved childcare providers must comply with standards in ensuring that their services facilitate quality care and learning. They are obliged to report any allegations, incidents or complaints that child abuse has occurred. It is increasingly clear that we must look to preventative measures against these abhorrent actions to ensure that no child comes to harm in a place where they should be safe, cared for and learning.

As a matter of priority, we have commissioned an urgent review into child safety in childcare centres, and marked attention is being paid to the processes of obtaining a working with children check in Victoria. Jay Weatherill and Pamela White will be conducting a review into current requirements and standards in procuring a working with children check in Victoria, and every single recommendation made from the findings of this report will be accepted and implemented by the Allan Labor government. Mr Weatherill and Ms White are qualified to conduct this report and are expected to report back to the Parliament in just a couple of weeks, around 15 August. Mr Weatherill was the South Australian Minister for Early Childhood and Development before taking the position of state Premier, and following his tenure in politics, he has worked to reform and strengthen outcomes in early childhood education through his leadership with the Minderoo Foundation’s Thrive by Five program. We are confident of his capacity to excel in this endeavour. Ms White is similarly highly qualified for the task, as chair of the Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority, providing unique expertise in regulation and registration that will serve well towards our intention to implement a statewide registry of childcare workers. With the combined expertise and experience of these two distinguished individuals, I am confident that they will provide our Parliament with comprehensive and targeted advice on reforming our regulatory bodies.

The aforementioned registry of childcare workers makes up one significant part of the review’s scope and will be referred to as the early childhood workforce register. In its first stage of implementation, it will require childcare centres with government-funded kindergarten programs to provide details of all staff by 29 August. This will capture crucial information on childcare workers from over 90 per cent of the sector, with the other 10 per cent, including agency staff and fill-ins, being registered through a second round of data collection rolling out in October. This register will be updated quarterly to ensure accurate and timely information and will record information of all early childhood careworkers in this category who have contact with children of any age in their line of work, including their role, their gender, working with children check status, start and end date of their employment, and their reason for leaving the service.

Further, work has been undertaken to capture information on regulated childcare industries, including long day care services, non-government-funded kindergartens and day care services, outside school hours care and occasional care, ensuring that no childcare worker will slip through the cracks and that every family can be assured that their service’s workers are eligible, qualified and trustworthy.

But to return to the discussion of the working with children check, currently this check serves as evidence of the individual’s record being clear from conviction of child abuse in any form. But any way in which we can strengthen these processes to tighten the requirement to qualify for a working with children check and to ensure that the statewide regulator for child safety standards, the quality assessment and regulation division, is functioning efficiently and comprehensively as possible we will implement as swiftly as possible, because the safety of Victorian children and our childcare and early learning education centres is not up for negotiation.

One such reform that will be implemented alongside recommendations from the review being conducted by Mr Weatherill and Ms White will be that prohibition notices issued by the Department of Education will be taken into consideration when evaluating an individual’s eligibility to be granted a working with children check. As the system currently stands, the process only takes into account criminal charges and a regulatory finding out of child abuse. In short, the system will flag an act of child abuse that has already occurred. But it is beyond evident that these processes must be strengthened to ensure that our regulatory bodies are taking a proactive approach to preventing child abuse, because it should not take even a single child being harmed before a bad actor is disqualified from working in the industry, as is alleged to have occurred in Victorian childcare centres.

As there is still an active investigation going, I, like the Premier, will not say anything that could impact judicial proceedings, but these allegations have made it abundantly clear that reform is needed across the sector. To circle back to the work of the quality assessment and regulation division (QARD), it maintains and enforces child safety standards in early childhood education and care statewide using powers granted under the Education and Care Services National Law Act 2010 and the Children’s Services Act 1996 to monitor and enforce compliance and standards. This body operates under various child safety frameworks in place through the national quality framework, the education and care services national law, the Education and Care Services National Regulations 2011, the national quality standard, the Victorian children’s services regulatory scheme under the Children’s Services Act 1996, the Children’s Services Regulations 2020 and through regulation of the child safe standards for all early childhood services in Victoria under the Child Wellbeing and Safety Act 2005.

As you can see, the QARD operates under both state and national frameworks, and as such any reform subsequent to the review conducted by Weatherill and White will be initially focused on the Victorian legislation and the state frameworks, but this will be based upon the work already occurring at a national level alongside the Commonwealth and other states and territories. The federal government is working hard in turn to strengthen the child safety regulations in the industry, and with a national register of childcare workers currently in development we will be able to link our state registry body with its national counterpart, ensuring that nobody slips through the cracks and that child safety is protected through uniform regulation and standards.

Families have the right to feel safe dropping their children off at childcare centres across the state. These centres are critical for Victorian families and children, particularly for dual-income households and those who simply need to work while raising a child, not to mention the education or social benefits of young children’s experience attending early learning, care and educational centres. It is imperative that the public trust in these institutions as well as our statewide regulatory and compliance bodies is maintained so that parents can continue working and providing for families while knowing that Victorian childcare centres are safe, regulated and free from harmful actors and so that children can benefit from the educational outcomes from early learning programs, which our government has funded and strengthened significantly over the last few years.

I would like to thank the Premier, alongside ministers, government departments, experts such as Jay Weatherill and Pamela White and all the organisations that have facilitated this swift and decisive action against further harm, because child safety is absolutely paramount and the Allan Labor government will take every action to ensure that.

Business interrupted pursuant to sessional orders.