Seven services that offer out-of-school-hours care, mostly in small rural communities, were rejected for government funding in recent months, including some that had been reliant on funding for 10 years or more.
“I’m aware of at least five services that are at risk of imminent closure without a lifeline from the government,” Dr Haines said.
“If these services close, parents won’t be able to work if they can’t find alternate care.
“This situation will have devastating impacts on hundreds of families and their schools.”
Dr Haines has been working closely with affected services to find a solution, including Moyhu Primary School, Greta Valley Primary School, Yackandandah Primary School, Whitfield Primary School and Indigo North Health’s service operating out of Rutherglen Primary School.
“My office has been working on this matter for weeks and when I first became aware of the issue, I discussed it with Minister Anne Aly in person that very day,” Dr Haines said.
Dr Haines continued the fight for the services, asking a question of the Early Childhood Education Minister, Ms Aly, in Question Time on Wednesday.
“If these services close, parents won’t be able to work in a cost-of-living crisis,” Dr Haines said in parliament.
“It is clear there is not enough money in the Community Child Care Fund. Will the minister stand by while vital childcare services close due to lack of government funding?”
In reply, Ms Aly said in the most recent round of funding, “more than 380 services received offers of sustainability support to help them remain open and 90 services received offers of capital support”.
“That’s to help them undertake important modification or expansion of their work, and that includes five services in the member’s electorate that received sustainability funding and two services that received capital funding,” she said.
“The CCCF round four grant opportunity was a competitive grant. It’s a competitive grant process run by the department, and decisions are made at arm’s length from the minister.
“The guidelines for the grant opportunity were published on GrantConnect. The assessment criteria remained broadly similar across all CCCF rounds for sustainability funding, but there were some changes in the grant guidelines reflecting lessons learned on reviews of previous grant rounds.
“Those lessons and the feedback that we got on those were that the round should be open to applications from priority areas as well as services that have been successful in previous rounds as well as vulnerable and disadvantaged cohorts.
“I appreciate that it can be disappointing for services when they’re not successful in competitive grants. I can really appreciate that.
“I can appreciate the difficulty for families and communities, and I can appreciate the way in which we can continue to discuss this, particularly for your electorate as well, Member for Indi.
“I’d encourage the member to relay to those services that there is a CCCF special circumstances round that they may be eligible to apply for and to encourage them to see whether or not that is a viable option.”
Dr Haines has been assisting services to apply for special circumstances funding to keep the doors open. One of the services has already been successful in receiving special circumstances funds, but others are still waiting for news.
“It’s more than disappointing for these services — it's devastating,” Dr Haines said.
“Over 800 services across Australia met the criteria for funding but only 475 received funding. The need is huge.
“The services already run on the smell of an oily rag and are based in small communities that are heavily dependent on the funding to deliver out-of-school-hours care for local families.
“I’m worried about the stress this puts on parents who are already doing it tough and the early childcare educators who will be forced out of jobs if the services close.”
Dr Haines said the government needed to offer more than sympathy to the services and families that were missing out.
“The minister’s answer showed the government doesn’t understand the impact the closure of these services will have on these families and communities. They need to act and urgently so,” Dr Haines said.
“The massive reduction in services that received funding suggests to me that something has gone seriously wrong with the system or how the grant application process was administered.
“This is a problem of the government’s making and something they need to step in and fix.”
