Childcare workers - still sitting at the bottom of the salaries pile...

[i-need-a-martini]

...and that is the way the government likes it apparently.

So even though many staff and centres have already signed their enterprise agreements for a wage increase and even though last Thursday Abbott announced he would 'honour' (and I use the word loosely) any EBAs signed to date and even though the single biggest issue facing the childcare industry has been a large staff turnover of staff due to poor salaries, poor conditions and poor working contracts, the Coalition have decided to reroute that funding elsewhere.

No increases in salaries.

No enterprise bargaining agreements.

No help for workers in one of the most undervalued and underpaid sectors of our community.

http://sussanley.com/coalition-delivers-childcare-educators-fairer-funding/

One dishonest bumble after another from our Liberal leader.

[i-need-a-martini]

Should also point out that whilst apparently the funding has been rerouted due to findings from a report commissioned one month ago and from submissions recieved to date, the submissions don;t close until Feb 2014 and the report won't be released until Oct 2014, 

So again we have a minister (ala Pyne) who makes decisions without any stategic back up for policy development.

Why?

[chuk_77]

majority of services were not going to see a cent of the money anyway as most dont quote me but something like 70% work under the award and are not on agreements so most of us were missing out. Educators are use to the government pulling stunts on us anyway, been happening for years but until recently Educators were not ever really mentioned as we didnt "gain votes"

[i-need-a-martini]

It doesn't matter if you are a union member or not. The EBA was not an individual agreement based on union membership but a centre based agreement based on qualifications and training.

The wage increase was to ensure that staff were qualified and that centres would have incentives to employ professional carers with the proper qualifications instead of the casual, unqualified staff which has been on the increase over the last decade.

To get the extra money for their staff centres had to have qualified staff on their payroll.

It was a win-win for centres, carers and parents.

[cherples]

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@chuk_77 wrote:

majority of services were not going to see a cent of the money anyway as most dont quote me but something like 70% work under the award and are not on agreements so most of us were missing out. Educators are use to the government pulling stunts on us anyway, been happening for years but until recently Educators were not ever really mentioned as we didnt "gain votes"

---

Educators have always had the right to join a union and lobby for better wages and conditions but it seems there are many within the ranks that don't understand the value in unions or have bought into the old unions are scum line of abbott the bully.  Now he wants to bully them into "doing the right thing" and go without their pay increase.   

[chuk_77]

there was more to it than that martini.

cherples I know the union is open to everyone. We fought for 3 years just to get our very first pay rise. I know how our union works Im in it.

Centres had to apply for the money based on a lot of different criteria one being that workers had to be on an agreement., Most centres dont have agreements most work under the award. 

[i-need-a-martini]

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@chuk_77 wrote:

there was more to it than that martini.

cherples I know the union is open to everyone. We fought for 3 years just to get our very first pay rise. I know how our union works Im in it.

Centres had to apply for the money based on a lot of different criteria one being that workers had to be on an agreement., Most centres dont have agreements most work under the award. 

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But that was the whole point of the agreements chuk. 

Whilst most childcare centre workers are covered by an award, a large proportion aren't. This includes casual staff, staff covered by other awards (ie. those in govt/council run centres), and (and this is the increasing market) staff that work outside of standard hours including those working in early/late opening centres, public holiday, wekends etc. The latter are the ones that are being exploited the most.

And the award wage is so low. It is on par with sales assistant wages. Not that I am down playing the importance of what a sales assistant does but in no way does it compare to what is required to care for children.

The EBA criteria that had to be satisfied covered a lot of ground but the main aim was that it meant that staff had to be qaulified and also that centres could only employ a certain percentage of casual staff and working conditions for all staff needed to be improved.

The whole point of an EBA is that all staff should agree. That's why it is called an agreement. It doesn't REPLACE the award - it is a negotiated enhancement to the award.

[chuk_77]

martini under the NQF that is the case anyway, always has been but recently the ratio changed and all ECE had to have a cert 3 min.

That is regardless of agreements awards or anything else. 

Ill post the criteria after dinner

[i-need-a-martini]

All ECE's have to have their Cert 111 quals but not all care staff at the centre have to. You can run a large centre with a handful of qualified staff and as long as there is always someone qualified, then the other carers do not need anything beyond first aid etc.

For small centres isn't the ratio something like a qualified ECE must be available for 20% of the time that the centre is open or something?

But I would be keen to see the criteria cause it has disapperared off federal government department websites along with the info about EBAs.

[chuk_77]

there are qualified and unqualified ratios To work in early childhood you must have cert 3 min its part of the NQF. Service must employ a min of cert 3 holders. All service must now have an Early childhood teacher(New requirement) then there are the diploma qualified. Different ages require different ratios and they have been lowered

Not applicable to OSHC though and if I remember right this payment was only for the cert 3's so all the qualified staff miss out on it. I was wrong up there somewhere, it was only 15% of the industry were eligible for the pay increase

the criteria for services to meet to be able to apply for this - remeber this pat rise was not automatic

- a demonstrated commitment at the service to
quality outcomes for children under the
National Quality Framework (NQF), including a
detailed plan to meet NQF qualification
requirements (always been a requirement anyway)

- an agreement to utilise grant funds exclusively
for wage increases, including detailed
acquittal of funds

 a commitment to affordability for families
through fee restraint limited to actual
operating cost increases (and no increases as
a result of wages arising from the operation of
the Fund)

- increased fee transparency requirements for
services, including explaining to parents the
level of financial assistance provided by the
Australian Government through Child Care
Benefit and Child Care Rebate, and
- meeting specific reporting requirements for
MyChild. (already a requirement through CCMS)

Funding will be conditional on wage increases
being included in an enterprise bargaining
agreement.