Skilled professionals leaving regional towns because of lack of child care
July 15, 2010
Nagambie is a small country town which like so many others, struggles to find skilled medical professionals and other workers.
When women with children are those skilled workers, there is another problem; child care.
Dr Sharman Stone, Shadow Minister for the Status of Women, Early Childhood Education and Childcare said the only child care available in Nagambie is a terrific little not-for-profit centre owned by Strathbogie Shire. The difficulty is the centre has to spread time and space between offering four year old and three year old kindergarten as well as child care.
“Working families, who need full time child care, find that is just not available in the town. The best some mothers can get is six to nine hours a week. This means women who need the second income to pay their mortgages or want to maintain their careers drive 52 kms up the road to work in the much bigger centre, Shepparton, where there is some child care available. “
“Shelly {Not her real name} is a qualified health professional who received a scholarship to bring her much needed, specialist skills in women’s reproductive health to Nagambie. Shelly needs full-time child care to pursue her career and is now faced with the inevitable prospect of having to instead practice in Shepparton where she can find full-time child care.
“This is a lose-lose scenario all round, with the town not having her services, the children having to be driven long distances before they commence their child care for the day,” Sharman Stone said.
“The Rudd-Gillard Labor Government’s new 15 hours per week minimum requirement for pre schooling is also putting enormous pressure on the qualified preschool staff who previously provided their services for one 4 year old group in two towns, commuting in between. With the hours going from 10 to 15, one of those kindergartens will have to find itself a new preschool teacher.
“This is chaos in both the kindergarten and child care sectors and meanwhile, the Rudd-Gillard Government has slashed the subsidies to parents paying childcare fees. It has required class-to-child ratios to come down, it demanded additional qualifications for child care and pre-school staff, all of this without any consideration of the additional cost impacts, the lack of access to child care places and the lack of readily available qualified preschool and child care staff. Both the Brumby and Gillard Governments are guilty of not understanding how this social infrastructure is critically important for local women to utilise their skills in the workforce.”
“Grandparents are not automatically living next door. When women who need to work, or who want to work need to travel between towns for up to an hour each way, we clearly have a ridiculous situation for their children in tow and for their own capacity to balance work and family caring responsibilities.”
“A lot must change and that will begin with a change of Government,” Sharman Stone said.