On Tuesday 18 March 2025, the Victorian Women’s Trust proudly presented the second of our Trust Women: Lunch Break Sessions, a six-part policy webinar series designed to break down some of the most important gender equality policy challenges facing Australia today.

The quality of early childhood education and care (ECEC) is a direct reflection of our values as a society. Yet in Australia, families continue to struggle with access and affordability, while early childhood educators remain among the lowest-paid workers in the country. In Early Childhood Education and Care: Making a Fairer System for Families and Children, our expert panel discussed how we can drive meaningful policy change, and create a fairer system for families, children, and workers alike.

Speakers: 

• Maddy Butler is Campaign Director at The Parenthood
• Luara Ferracioli is a philosopher, researching children’s wellbeing at the University of Sydney
• Moderator: Mary Crooks AO, Executive Director of the Victorian Women’s Trust

From February to June 2025, we’ll host expert-led discussions on key issues such as nuclear energy, early childhood education, abortion access, housing, youth mental health, and tech-facilitated abuse. Each session will offer insights from leading thinkers, advocates, and policy experts, helping us better understand the blockers to progress and, more importantly, the pathways forward. Learn more about our upcoming webinars. They’re all free but registration is essential.

Further Resources

The Parenthood

A Flourishing Childhood: The Future of Early Childhood Education and Care in Australia – Sydney Social Sciences and Humanities Advanced Research Centre White Paper

At What Cost – Podcast

Philosophy of Child Rearing – Podcast

Thrive by Five – Campaign

Betrayal of Trust: Australia’s Childcare Crisis – Four Corners

Winding back childcare “Activity Test” a seismic win for children, equity & nation – The Parenthood

The Minefield ‘What does it mean to be a moral parent?’ – Podcast

Transcript

Note: Transcript is provided for reference only, and has been edited for clarity. Please confirm accuracy before quoting.

Mary Crooks AO: Hello everyone, and welcome to this very special webinar on early childhood education and care. It’s the second of our Lunch Break Sessions.

What I would like to do before we begin is to acknowledge Country. And we are here on Wurundjeri land at our office in Clifton Hill. And I noticed that one of the panelists, Maddy, is on Wurundjeri land as well. So could I just say, in paying our respects to First Nations people, past and present Elders, that this is the time that we not only issue our profound respect for First Nations people, but we double down on making sure that we never allow a winding back of Acknowledgment of Country or Welcome to Country.

It was to me incredibly disconcerting to see someone like Clive Palmer prepared to spend thousands and thousands of dollars exhorting Australians that we should never feel as though we have to welcome ourselves to this country. And I just think that, that’s an early call to action that we try and protect that kind of practice. And we grow it even further from here.

To do otherwise is to continue to disrespect our First Nations people. So welcome to this session. I’m delighted to say that we’ve got two incredible panelists today. So we’ll hear from the panel and then we’ll have a Q&A session a little bit later on. And I’ll throw back then to our panelists for some final comments before we wrap up.

This is being recorded. So there will be a recording that can be shared in the weeks to come. So without further ado let me welcome our panelists.

First up we’ve got Maddy Butler. Maddy is Campaign Director for The Parenthood. She has a wonderful background in communications, script writing, management, and digital campaigns. At The Parenthood, as I say, she’s Campaign Director. And The Parenthood, if you don’t know, it has the glorious simple and elegant aim of making Australia the best place in the world to be a parent and a carer. And Maddy herself has two small kids.

We also have Doctor Luara Ferracioli. Luara is formerly a postdoctoral fellow at Oxford and Princeton. She was assistant professor at the University of Amsterdam from 2013 to 2017. She’s currently at the University of Sydney where she is associate professor of political philosophy. And Luara’s research interests are in moral philosophy, political theory, feminist philosophy, and applied ethics. So welcome to our two very special panelists. So over to you our panelists.

Maddy I’m going to start with you. You’re a formal representative of The Parenthood. And as I mentioned you’ve got two little nippers of your own, but what do you see as some of the early common experiences of families across Australia when it comes to early childhood education and care? What are some of the common experiences?

Maddy Butler: Hi Mary and thanks for having me on. I think there are many common experiences for parents, and I say this not just only as a parent myself having put my children through early childhood education and care, but also having heard so many stories from parents and carers across the country. One really important thing is the educators, and having that connection and that continuity of care for your children with educators. Speaking from personal experience, drop offs have not always been easy with my daughter. And if there was the educator at the centre who she loved and adored. Then they were a walk in the park. She would happily go off to them. And I cannot tell you how much I was in love with those educators, because that was just so important.

On a less positive note I think a lot of parents and carers understand the struggle of trying to navigate such a complicated system. From Centrelink to just finding the right centre, to how you get there? How you make it work around your own paid work commitments? That can often be a struggle. And you know dealing with Centrelink has left me in tears at times, and I’m sure people can relate. And also just the struggle to access early learning, and to also pay for it. It can so often be hard to access if at all. And so often the out-of-pocket expenses are ridiculously high, and often for in a two parent family, for the secondary earner, sometimes you’ve got to weigh up whether it’s even worth it.

Mary Crooks AO: Maddy, can I follow up then.? I mean you’ve talked about that, as in listening to your response, you’ve talked about the struggle, you referred to the struggle and the navigability and so on. So, which is a little bit of a worry at the outset that you’re defining that you know one of the common experiences around childcare is around struggle, when it’s at a time I would have thought in the child’s life, and the parents life, and the carers life, that we should be trying to take the struggle out of it. Having said that, and having watched Four Corners last night, which was just such, well it was such an unpleasant reminder to someone like myself who has been railing against the privatisation of services such as aged care and early childhood for decades. Thank you very much Mr Howard, Mr Costello, and in Victoria Mr Kennett.

But the genie’s been out of the bottle for decades now, over the privatisation of these core services in our community. But can I ask you for your response last night into watching that heartbreaking Four Corners about the so-called quality of care, with people cutting corners to make profit?

Maddy Butler: Yes. It truly was a harrowing episode last night and I want to start off by saying that absolutely no child should experience the experiences of those children featured last night. Every single child deserves equitable access to high quality, inclusive, culturally safe early childhood education and care. What we’re seeing is that there are, as you say Mary, private providers who are putting profit before children. And I think that was very clearly articulated in the Four Corners episode. What we believe is that the federal government in, well working with all levels of government, so state and local as well, needs to take on a public management role of the system. So essentially be system stewards and ensure that every single child has access to some form of care that is high quality. And this needs to include looking at the early childhood education sector who perform such invaluable work. But it is demanding and it’s not recognised as the truly incredible profession that it is. You know, I started off by saying that continuity of care is so important for children and also for parents and carers to know that we’re trusting our children with the right educators. So we need quality educators, we need quality services, and we need adequate and appropriate funding, but also intervention from the federal government working with state governments. And so we need the governments to step up on this.

Mary Crooks AO: That’s a really, I might come back to that Maddy. I love that phrase you used, of government playing a role as system stewards.We might return to that. So thank you. Luara as I said in the introduction you have this moral philosophical experience and perspective to bring to bear on a provision like early childhood education and care. So given that, how do you rate currently, how do you rate the question of early childhood education and care as a political and a public policy priority in this country? We’ve been a bit slow to it don’t you think?

Luara Ferracioli: So let me just start by saying that I’m also a parent. I have three young children, the youngest still attending early childhood education and care, and I have had an amazing experience with early childhood education and care in Australia. I moved here from the Netherlands, and we also had access to really good ECEC there, but we’ve always dealt with the not for profit sector with our children, and we’ve had the most wonderful experience, and that has definitely influenced my work in this area. But of course, as a philosopher I’m coming from a, you know I have my parent hat always, but I’m writing about this as a philosopher. And one of my main areas of research is children’s wellbeing. And I’m interested in the question of what it means for children to lead good lives while children. Not just how childhood prepares children for leading a good life later on, which is something you know, everyone cares about.

And it’s very salient in public discourse. But we don’t often ask what does it mean for childhood to go well, irrespective of the effects that will have in that child’s adulthood? And so that’s the question I’m very interested in, because I think philosophers have a lot of very insightful things to say about wellbeing more generally, and wellbeing in childhood in particular. And so one of the things I was very interested in was, does ECEC help children lead good childhoods? And the more I thought about what it means for childhood to go well, the more I thought that yes, actually early childhood education and care play a very important role in creating the conditions for children to lead good childhoods. And so with that background, I asked a question, do we as a society take this as seriously as we should? And the answer, unfortunately, is no. I mean, it’s great to see that it’s a signature policy policy area say for the Prime Minister. You know we might get more announcements during the election, but we have a sense of where the PM is heading and it’s great that it is up there with many other policy priorities.

But I think as a society, we haven’t yet developed the right attitudes toward early childhood education and care. We still see it as primarily an issue of productivity and gender equality. And of course it is. Absolutely. I’m a full time working parent. I think it’s essential that I have access to ECEC if I’m going to flourish as a worker. If I’m going to participate in society. But I think it’s really important that we bring children’s perspective into the conversation. And I’m very interested in the question, what does it mean for Australia to be the best place to be a child? And high quality ECEC is definitely part of the puzzle. We’re not there yet. We’re heading in that direction. There’s more work to be done.

Mary Crooks AO: That’s terrific. Luara just to introduce early in our discussion you know a philosophical dimension in that sense of what constitutes a good childhood, and I guess instinctively and intuitively last night, watching Four Corners, in a way it was that sense that was being offended. You know, when you’ve got kids being brutalised, and when you’ve got kids being harmed and hurt and treated cruelly, that’s what was devastating about it, was that here are kids who should be learning to be loved and to be loved. And learning to be, you know, to have a good childhood experience, and having that to be so knocked around. So thank you for introducing the philosophical dimension. Nice and quickly.

One of the reasons, one of the reasons that early childhood education and care is more on the political agenda right now. I want to actually acknowledge the great work that’s been done by, not just The Parenthood, but a whole lot of other advocate groups and campaigns like the Thrive by Five campaign over a couple of years now. Because this kind of background, invisible advocacy work often doesn’t get the tributes that it deserves. Because I think, left to their own devices, the two major parties would not have necessarily picked up early childhood education and care as a political priority, were it not for the advocacy work of women and men in getting it up there. So having said that, can I ask you both? So federal Labor has implemented and committed to several policy changes, the increase in wages to early educators, the early education fund, the three days, especially, of subsidised early learning. And the flat fee issue of paying no more than $10 or $20. So maybe back to you, Maddy, for a start. What’s your take on on those particular commitments from federal Labor? How how significant are they to date?

Maddy Butler: These are enormously significant commitments and policy reforms that we’ve seen from the federal government. We knew early on that they had made a commitment to universal early childhood education and care, which we interpret as every single child having access to some form of provision that’s high quality and affordable, and meets the needs of that child. So, we are definitely heading in that direction. As Luara said before, we’re definitely heading in the right, right way. But, it’s going to take more and it is going to take a lot of policy reform and consideration. What we’re hoping for is a long term vision that’s probably going to take a decade, because we don’t want something that’s rushed and we want to be thinking long term. We want to be thinking about what is truly right for the country. And just to explain my perspective a little more, I lead the campaign at The Parenthood calling for improved access to early childhood education and care in regional, rural and remote Australia. So, the BEEF fund, the Building Early Education Fund. You know, was music to my ears.

It’s very exciting to see that the federal government really does want to build and expand centres in areas of high need, and a lot of these areas will be in the regions. However, having worked on this campaign over the last two years, I know that 160 spots is not going to cut it. It’s definitely one of those right steps, but it is not, you know, it’s not the end goal exactly. That being said, the government has made this commitment to universal, the three day guarantee and the commitment to a fixed fee model definitely suggests that they are prepared to put in the work that’s needed to ensure that there’s access for every child everywhere, and also that something needs to be done for the early childhood education sector. Because there needs to be more improvements for the sector to ensure that we just increase recruitment and retention.

Mary Crooks AO: Maddy, before I ask Luara for her take, when the three days guaranteed, subsidised early learning was announced by the federal government, I think maybe sort of around October, November last year. I followed that in terms of the media, the traditional, mainstream media at the time, and there was scarcely any coverage of it. And I’m just wondering, is that something that you shared too? That I think it showed in my mind that one of the, one of the problems in advocating for early childhood education and care is that the mainstream media tends to relegate it as a women’s issue, and therefore not something that should be, in fact, up there with Medicare, up there with NDIS, up there with some of the hallmarks of what constitutes a really good society. Is that your view? Do you feel the media has actually not been terribly interested in the childcare policy reform?

Maddy Butler: I probably have a slightly different opinion, as we have actually at The Parenthood, secured quite good media on these issues over the last few years. Of course, often the media gravitate towards the more devastating stories. So I think Four Corners has been, picked up quite a bit, but mostly by the ABC, which does Four Corners, of course. But often as well, these policy reforms and commitments can be quite difficult to translate into, just understandable changes for families. We think perhaps as well. Sometimes governments struggle with doing that translation themselves. And that’s the role for advocates then to step in and show why this is important. It also, of course, depends on the particular media outlets. Some are more interested in this than others. We’re definitely trying to paint it as just incredibly important reform for the whole country. Not just children, not just parents and carers or particularly women, but the whole economy and the whole community.

But yeah. Perhaps I have a different perspective because I have been able to deal with some media, but I haven’t stepped back and looked at what does the media landscape look like, and where does early childhood education and care fit into that? My hope, my dream is that in the lead up to the federal election, we can keep talking about it and talking about all the positives that ECEC bring and, why we need to continue reform in this space.

Mary Crooks AO: Thanks, Maddy. Luara, what’s your take on the reforms so far ushered in by federal government?

Luara Ferracioli: So again, I agree with Maddy, that we’re heading in the right direction. That many commitments that are, you know, music to my ears. But I also, when Maddy says, look, I’ve worked on the ground, I know that the commitment that has been put in place for regional access is not enough. What that tells me is that we’re still not taking it as seriously as we should. Right? We wouldn’t accept a situation where parts of Australia have no access to healthcare, have no access to, you know, primary school, high school education. And I do think early childhood education and care is as important. I think there are very good arguments as to why that is the case. And so I think as a society, we still haven’t yet developed the right attitude towards ECEC. And if you look at the media, I mean, I agree with both of you because Maddy is right, they’ve done an amazing job in terms of, The Parenthood has done an amazing job, in terms of advocating for ECEC. You are doing. I’m so excited for the work you’re doing. Thank you.

But Mary is also right that when you compare with other topics that are just as important, it doesn’t get as much attention. And if you read the comments that people. You know, if you go to Sydney Morning Herald, for example, my local newspaper in Sydney, and there’s a story about ECEC and you read the comments, there are so many people who genuinely believe that it is the primary, you know, early education is the responsibility of parents or that women have already achieved, you know, equality in the workplace. So why spend all this money on this? And so that’s why I think it’s really important to slightly change the conversation to get the broader public on board with the idea that this is really an entitlement. Now, why is it an entitlement? First, because it’s really important that when children start primary school, they are, you know, they’ve developed the social, emotional, cognitive skills to flourish in formal education, right?

And we have data showing that is children have access to ECEC, they are better positioned to make use of all the opportunities that are available in the kind of formal school years. That’s one reason. So the issue of social equality. We, education is one of the most important means for achieving social equality, in a society like Australia. And it’s unfair if a child starts primary school not being able to make use of those opportunities to the same extent as other children who have had access to early childhood education and care. It’s just not fair. And I think if that’s well articulated, hopefully the public can see that, you know, there is no way in which children are responsible for starting their formal school years at a disadvantage. You know, in a disadvantaged way. However you want to put that. So that’s one argument. The other argument is that many of the goods of childhood, things like friendship, caring relationships with other adults who expose children to other ways of thinking, of ways of living. You know, who will pay attention to some of the child’s interests that may not be stimulated at home. These are things that can be available to all children in an early childhood education and care setting.

Like some children have parents, because I think a lot of parents think, but I can provide all of that, right? I can make sure my children, I spend enough time with friends that they are having their, you know, curiosity fed into, you know, that I’m giving them the resources to kind of seek the things they are curious about and passionate about. They don’t need early childhood education and care. But the reality is that many parents can’t, don’t have the time, the resources to provide those opportunities. And early childhood education and care can provide all children with the opportunities for pursuing what I call the goods of childhood. Friendship, exploration, carefreeness, caring relationships with other adults. And so I think once we start telling that story, hopefully the public can see that, you know, it’s not just about making sure parents can go to work. It is about children having the best start in life, that we can provide them.

Mary Crooks AO: Luara, thank you so much for making that broader case. Can I ask both of you now to, give us your, your views on where you think the coalition is in, you know, we’re maybe a matter of a couple of weeks away from a campaign beginning. And it’s going to be a fairly short campaign anyhow, because time is running out, on, on government. What do you see as emerging, from the Coalition’s perspective, on early childhood education and care? Maddy, maybe let’s start with you.

Maddy Butler: Sure. Well, as far as we can tell, there have been no policy commitments on early childhood education and care from the Coalition. Look, I have met with members of the Coalition, both the Liberal Party and the Nationals party over the last few years, regarding our campaigns. They definitely do understand the issue. And they do know that in their electorates, families are struggling with early childhood education and care, particularly access, and that this has flow on effects for whole communities. At this stage, yes, there has been no, no movement in this space from there end, in terms of, concrete policies. We just urge them to match, if not better, the federal government’s commitments and to also, if elected after the federal election, to not backtrack on anything. We have seen in the media that the Coalition has not agreed with the removal of the activity test, which is part of the three day guarantee from the federal government. The activity tests just really does not do what it was intended to do. It actually prohibits families, particularly those facing disadvantage, from accessing early childhood education and care. And rather than trying to, you know, the removal of the activity test is not going to prevent working families from accessing care themselves. What we’re working towards is ensuring that every single child gets access no matter what.

Mary Crooks AO: Maddy, just given that that’s such a critical point around the removal of the activity test, can you just take our listeners through that key concept of the activity test and why you wanted that out?

Maddy Butler: Yes. So it is another element of navigating the early childhood education and care system that’s just not fun for anyone. So basically, the idea for the activity test is that parents need to be undertaking a certain amount of hours of a certain activity, such as paid employment, study or volunteering. And that would then allow them a certain amount of hours of subsidised care. Again, it is just one of those, you’ve got another ball to juggle up in the air by doing this. It is complex and not necessarily easy to understand for everyone. But also for families who are in vulnerable situations who can’t necessarily access any of those, you know, one of those activities or enough hours of such an activity. This then comes back to what Luara was saying before, where we’re just focusing on the productivity of what that kind of outcome comes from early childhood education and care. Whereas, actually we need to be thinking about what does the child need, and every single child deserves some form of access. If that’s what the family would like. And it shouldn’t be dependent on what the parents and carers have been doing. We definitely encourage its removal. So, that’s probably, if the opposition has voiced some concern about the activity test being taken away, that’s something that people really need to be keeping a watch on. Definitely. It is something that’s concerning to us.

Mary Crooks AO: Okay. Luara, what’s your take on what you think is coming out of the opposition work on policy around early education, childhood education and care?

Luara Ferracioli: Well, my take is that they don’t really get it, right? The fact that they have opposed the activity test, the removal for the three days, shows that they don’t really see it as an entitlement on the part of children. And I think some of the comments we saw last week or maybe the week before about working from home and that, you know, parents. First of all, the idea that so long as, a rule was applied equally, there’s no unfairness for us to address is, you know, troubling that there is, an alternative government that doesn’t see that sometimes equal rules lead to unequal outcomes. But let’s just put that aside. The comment about parents going back to part time work if working from home is no longer available again, shows that they don’t really get it. You know, women are equal citizens. They should be able to flourish in the workplace as much as men. And, we need political leaders that start challenging so many of those problematic assumptions around who does the care. You know, what, what the state owes families.

I think still, we don’t really see, many of our leaders, and I’m not going to point to any party here. When it comes to families and children in particular, I think there’s a, a lack of recognition that actually parents and the State share responsibility over children. It’s not just up to parents. There are many of children’s interests that simply cannot be protected and promoted by parents, no matter how well-intentioned and well-resourced. So we really need to think of the state as work in partnership with families in creating the conditions for parents to to succeed. And often what we do in Australia, even though we are a very wealthy country, we set parents up for failure. We do the opposite. We make it hard for them to parent well, right? So, what I’m seeing from the, you know, Dutton and his colleagues is just a lack of recognition of all the issues at play. And this kind of going back to something Maddy said before, a broader vision about what kind of society we should be moving towards. And in my mind, the society is a society where both men and women can flourish in the workplace, where both men and women can be active parents, and spend quality time with their children. And where the State creates all the conditions for families to parent well and for children to live good childhood, good childhoods. And ECEC is an essential part of that puzzle. We really should think of it as the beginning of education, part of the education system.

Yet, it’s not formal. No one wants 3 or 4 year olds to be sitting all day, you know. It’s play-based, it’s informal. It should be led by what children are curious about, fascinated about, and that time it should be treasured. Right? Later on, with formal education, there will be less freedom to explore the things they’re fascinated about, to play with their friends, to have fun. And so on. But it’s still education because they’re developing their cognitive capacities, their moral capacities. They’re becoming better citizens and also just better human beings who will then go on to be better parents and better friends and better colleagues in the workplace.

Mary Crooks AO: So, Luara you’ve enunciated a lovely vision there, including the role of the State in creating favourable conditions and support for people and children and families. Looking around, beyond Australia, are there, are there countries that are in a different gear from Australia in this regard?

Luara Ferracioli: So I lived in the Netherlands, and the Netherlands often ranks quite well in terms of children’s well-being. One thing I observed is that children are given more freedom in the Netherlands. Just the culture is such that children have a bit more autonomy. You know, you see more children walking to school by themselves, you see more children out and about. Something that used to be more part of life in Australia, and we’ve lost some of that. And of course, that enters into issues around social media, which is another discussion altogether. But that’s one thing I observed when I was there. The other thing is that school starts at age 4. So you might want to say that there’s like an extra kindy year, which maybe works as a preschool year, that it’s part of the formal setting, even though it’s not proper formal schooling. Of course, they know four year olds should be playing and should be exploring the environment. But that means that there is universal education for an earlier age. So I think that is interesting. And another thing you see in the Netherlands is that there’s a very anti homeschool culture. Sorry. Not homeschool. Well, homeschool as well but a homework culture, which I think means they really value those years. Childhood is very short and we need to treasure it and give children the opportunity to be children to do all these things that later on will be so hard for them to do.

So, I think that many countries have offered us glimpses of a better future. And if we’re a smart country, we should look around and look at the evidence and take what works elsewhere abroad. We can make, we can have our own mix, right? But the important thing to remember is that we are very wealthy. We can afford this. It’s about the choices we make. And so, there is no one. Just to answer your question in a more direct way, I wouldn’t point to any one specific country, I think different, you know, Canada has done a flat fee model. Scandinavia has a very strong pro-parent culture. I have colleagues who are academics in Scandinavia telling me that, who don’t have children, that they sometimes feel like they are the ones left out because at 3:00 on Friday, everyone is out. And don’t try and organise a meeting, don’t try and do anything. Almost like the change, the cultural change has been, it’s been so significant that it’s the people without children who feel like they’re being, you know, not supported in the workplace, which is interesting. Obviously, we don’t want to go that far. We want to make sure everyone, is treated fairly in the workplace.

Mary Crooks AO: Thank you.

Luara Ferracioli: No, no specific country. But I think a lot of great, lessons to be learned from around the world.

Yes, as you say, glimpses. Yeah. So just an encouragement, in terms of time, if people have got questions to Laura or Maddy, to fire them in. But let’s continue on. In terms of the immediate future. Say between now and the the federal election. Are there any specific campaigns, Maddy, for example, that people need to be aware of hooking into if they wanted to just step up on this issue of early childhood education and care?

Maddy Butler: Definitely. People should get onto our website. Follow The Parenthood on our social media. We will be constantly updating with all of the relevant news, and just what our views are on the offerings from all of the major parties. We’re also running well, I’ll be up in Orange later this week hosting a candidates forum on early childhood education and care, and in Nambucca Heads the following weekend. So if anyone lives in those areas, please come along. Everybody is welcome, including small children. We have lots of things geared towards children at these events. So yeah, and just, just we would encourage people to chat to other parents and carers about what’s going on. I think, you know, a lot of people in our society aren’t even fully aware that there is a federal election coming up soon. And what this means for families and that, you know, our votes do hold power. And we we will be offering more information on how, people can talk about these issues to other people.

Mary Crooks AO: Okay. So following The Parenthood, would be one of the best practical steps for the moment that people could take over the next weeks. Luara, what do you think people should be trying to do over the next few weeks to become more informed on this matter?

Luara Ferracioli: Yeah, I mean, absolutely. Follow The Parenthood. Also, now, don’t be scared to challenge problematic assumptions around early childhood education and care. You know, if someone just says no, but children are better off at home, ask them why? What’s the argument for that? Because the evidence tells us otherwise, right? And don’t be. Remember that children can’t advocate for themselves. Young children can’t. They’re not out there, you know, participating in public debate and saying, look, it’s actually wonderful when you have high quality ECEC, I get to hang out with my friends. I have these educators who I love. Right? I’m following my interests, and being supported in that. And I want to start school in the best position possible. So children can’t do that. So it’s really important that we adults, parents, but also those who are not parents. You don’t have to be a parent to advocate for children’s interests. You just have to be someone who cares about the future of this country and cares about this demographic who can’t articulate, you know. Can’t speak for themselves. Can’t make their own case. So to just challenge assumptions, call out the issues, the importance of thinking very carefully and seriously about children’s interests, and that we have the ability in Australia to be the best country to be a child. Let’s do it.

Mary Crooks AO: Coming back to the, so one of the questions, let me throw a question in from our audience. Sorry, Ally. That disappeared. The question disappeared. It’s gone.

Ally Oliver-Perham: Sorry, everyone. I’m going to be. Voice of God. This is Ally from team WVT. The question is, for those of us who appreciate early childhood educators to our core, like Maddy was describing at the start of the webinar, what can we do to better support the people who support our kids so well?

Mary Crooks AO: Maddy over to you.

Maddy Butler: I love this question. I have given it a lot of thought. So it definitely starts with better pay. They are one of the lowest paid professions in Australia. We do know that, of course as you mentioned Mary, the federal government has brought in a 15% pay increase, and already we’ve seen a 22% drop in vacancies in the sector. So that is encouraging. However, it’s going to take more than that. And a 15% increase on one of the lowest paid professions is still not enough, ultimately. So we would like to see more pay increases over the years, as well as recognising and respecting the profession and just really, well, in the same way we were regard teachers. Again, I know that culturally we probably don’t regard teachers as highly as we should, but, you know, they’re doing as important work as surgeons. They are really helping children, to thrive. And as Luara said, this is about our country’s future. They need better working conditions, professional development opportunities, mentorship opportunities. But also we need to take a holistic approach. So, for example, when we’re looking into regional Australia where we do need more access and therefore we need more educators, we need to think about adequate housing for them. We need to think about connection to the community. We need to ensure that we’re setting up our educators to thrive so they can help our children thrive.

Mary Crooks AO: Okay. Thank you. Luara, do you have anything to add to that?

Luara Ferracioli: No, I completely agree. And you know, when we say educators, teachers, we need to value them more as well. Maybe, you know, I’m a university professor. I think we should value them as much as we value university professors. I don’t think my work is more important than the work they do in any way.

Mary Crooks AO: Yeah. So, a question to you, Maddy In terms of the advocacy work you’ve been doing. Who are the movers and shakers in the federal government? Not just say, the one responsible minister, but who are the people who are really onto this and moving it within the federal government? And who are the movers and shakers who might be doing work from the Coalition point of view? I’m thinking in terms of of people in our audience, you know, feeling as though one thing they could be doing is to even get in touch with particular people. So who’s doing the heavy lifting within government and who’s doing, hopefully the heavy lifting within opposition?

Maddy Butler: Well, I should start off by saying that the Prime Minister has really spearheaded a lot of this. This is obviously something that is very close to his heart, because he has made early on these commitments to universal early education. Then, of course, there are the Ministers for Early Education, Minister Ali and Minister for Education, Minister Clare, who are very important as well as the treasurer, because this all comes down to a budget issue ultimately. What I would encourage people, though, is to actually contact your local representative. I think that that’s really important in the lead up to a federal election, because they care about who’s potentially voting for them. And they are going to report back to their parties when they’re hearing , look this just keeps coming out of my electorate. The access issue, the affordability issue for early childhood education and care.

I think also we have some really strong independent candidates who are already part of our, federal parliament, but also who are in the running to be in our next federal parliament. And a lot of them do take this issue very seriously. And so, if that’s in your electorate or if you have some kind of connection or just want to reach out to some of these independent candidates, it’s really good for them to be hearing about this as well. Particularly as we may well have a minority government, and they’re going to be some of the movers and shakers, for the next three years.

In terms of the Coalition, Angie Bell is the Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education. But I would really encourage people as well to reach out to Darren Chester who is a member of the National Party, and he is the Shadow Minister for Regional Education. So, again, very close to my personal issue around regional, rural and remote access. But we do think if we want to see the Coalition take on some broad policy reform and commitments in this space, then they need to keep hearing that this is really important. But yeah, I just I think it’s really worth just saying that when a federal elections coming up, they care most about their own constituents and voters.

Mary Crooks AO: Okay. Luara, just we need to start wrapping up soon. But I so enjoyed, the way you were framing, not just the question of ECEC from a productivity point of view and, you know, in terms of the, wellbeing of an economy, but also our society and the way in which children’s entitlements, in the best sense of the word, can be respected. So, can we ask you again to just restate, from again a wonderful philosophical point of view, the perspective that actually talks about a children-centred world, of guiding policy.

Luara Ferracioli: Yeah. So I would say children are equal citizens. The fact that they can’t vote or speak up doesn’t in any way change the fact that they are fellow citizens. That they have entitlements, they have interests. And a just society is a society that takes their interests just as seriously as the interests of voters and other groups in society. And so we need to always, as a society, think what our children are entitled to. What does it mean for to lead good lives? Remember, children can’t pursue a good life by themselves. They don’t have the autonomy. They don’t have the resources. They can’t enroll themselves into, you know, ECEC. And so we need to ask that question on their behalf. And I think there are very good reasons to think that early childhood education and care is a necessary component of a good early childhood. A high quality one, you know, and of course, going back to the Four Corners episode. No one thinks that just because some parents are abusive and neglecting, we’re going to get rid of the family.

So it’s the same thing here. Of course, some centres are, you know, doing a terrible job, but as a society, we can fix that, right? In the same way that it goes back to the point I made about setting up parents for success. We should be setting up our institutions for our success and our families for success. And so, we shouldn’t let that distract us from the main goal here. That doesn’t mean not take it seriously, but just the main goal is to create the conditions for children to flourish. And that means ECEC becomes an entitlement. And it’s not, it shouldn’t in any way depend on parental, parents’ capacity to pay. It shouldn’t depend on where they live in the country. It shouldn’t depend on their social class. None of these things, none of this should matter. It’s just an entitlement that children have that is good for their childhood, and that sets them up for success later on in life.

Mary Crooks AO:  Thank you. We need to wrap up, and before I make a few closing remarks, I’m going to give you both a chance to make a final reflection. But I was hoping to maybe guide you a bit, Maddy. By just a little bit more of an explanation over a term that I was very impressed with, that you used earlier. Which is in light of the excesses and the abuses, that you’re more likely to find in a privatised system in terms of shortcuts and profit motive dominance and so on. The notion you introduced about system stewards. How is The Parenthood likely to take that idea on, not just in the campaign, federal election campaign, but in the medium term post election? The system stewards idea of dealing with the shortfalls of a privatised system.

Maddy Butler: We are going to just continue talking about it, no matter who wins the federal election. We I’m very keen to maintain a relationship with them. And we do think, you know, it’s likely that there will be a minority government. So also with the crossbench. Having strong relationships with them to really talk about this idea that if we are going to try to work towards universal early childhood education and care, the federal government must be system stewards. We don’t see there being any other way of this being possible. The current market model does not work. It is failing families and communities. Children should not be placed after profit. And a one size fits all model will not work. We need to be working with communities, to design services that work for communities. And the federal government needs to ensure that every single service is appropriately funded. So that they can be high quality services and so that the educators will be high quality, and children are getting the best experience that they can. And when we look to other countries, it is so often the services that are appropriately funded by government and or run by government and or a not for profit, that are the most high quality and are best for children.

Mary Crooks AO: Thanks, Maddy. And Luara, over to you for a final reflection.

Luara Ferracioli: I’ll pick up on that point because I think it’s really, really important. We have empirical evidence that centres that are run by the government or non-for-profit do better, right? There is empirical evidence showing that’s the case. And I think that’s evidence the government needs to take very seriously as it goes about designing this new system, and really moving towards universal ECEC. But also, I think it’s not very hard to see why that’s the case, right? When you have an institution, you have to set up procedures, norms. You have to create a culture so that that institution or that organisation acts as a unified agent. As a kind of, it has a kind of reasonable point of view, if you like, because otherwise it’s just a collection of individuals doing their own thing. When you introduce a for profit motive, you change the culture and the norm of that institution. Right? So I think it would be much better. It’s just like, it’s very simple logic. An organisation that’s not in the pursuit of profit is more likely to be elevating children’s interests than one that’s also distracted by the profit motive.

Mary Crooks AO: Luara, thank you. And I’ve just seen a comment from one of the audience members, Jacinta, thanking you both, for an uplifting discussion. As she herself was reeling from watching Four Corners last night. So let me wind up with a few comments. I think, thank you very much Luara Ferracioli and Maddy Butler. Two splendid panelists coming together, for our webinar at 12 o’clock today. And strengths to your respective bows, as far as the work you’re doing. Strength to The Parenthood as far as the work that’s going on there Maddy. And your philosophical development around these ideas, Luara, I think has just been a really welcome addition to what can be sometimes a restrictive debate around productivity and the economy, stupid type thing. You know, it’s the economy. So thank you for your insights. It’s been wonderful.

Just like you to, as people in the audience, to remember that this was our second session in our Lunch Break Sessions. Our next one is scheduled for the 8th of April, and that’s on reproductive justice. And, going to be moderated by the wonderful Madison Griffiths. So keep an eye out for that one. And could I just thank, our staff, Rachael and Ally, for bringing this to you from a technical point of view today, but also for having the foresight to go after Maddy and Luara, as your expert panelists today.

It’s been a terrific discussion. And I thank you very much. And, and let’s hope that we can watch for further improvements in early childhood education and care to come. So go well everyone, and thank you all.

Ends