Annastacia Palaszczuk must look beyond free kindy plan as she seeks government reset

Cost-of-living relief - like free kindy for all Queensland families - in next month’s state budget must be coupled with funding to help solve bigger picture problems plaguing communities, writes the Editor.

Free kindergarten for all Queensland families would provide a welcome respite from increasing pressures on household budgets.

The idea, floated by Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in a wide-ranging interview by journalist Madura McCormack and published in today’s Sunday Mail, would save thousands of Queensland families more than $100 a week. It would also help ensure those few kids who are still falling through the cracks have the chance to start their school lives on the right footing.

Kindy is now considered a vital part of the developmental process with the play-based learning assisting kids in preparing for prep which in Queensland begins when they turn five.

Kindergarten is already free to some Queensland parents including Indigenous people and parents of triplets.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says her mostly working-class electorate keeps her in touch with cost-of-living pressures. Picture: Annette Dew

A government program to assist families with kindy already reaches more than 14,000 families providing them with a financial break representing around $4500 a year. A further 26,000 families can get a reduction of between $500 and $3500 a year on kindergarten costs depending on whether the child goes to a sessional kindy or a kindy in a long day care along with other factors like access to family tax benefits.

But the free kindy idea, if implemented, would reach around 8000 more kids and ensure no Queensland parent is financially locked out of the opportunity to have their child access a vitally important aspect of development.

Ms Palaszczuk, who says she is still only considering the free kindy proposal, has noted that educators are finding an increasing gap in the development of kids going to kindy, and those that don’t, when Queensland kids hit the prep year.

The promise of a cost free kindy will provide a positive lead into the state budget which will be handed down in a month and which the Premier herself affirms will have a “firm focus on cost of living’’.

The Premier reveals in today’s story that the plight of people in her own working-class electorate of Inala has given her an insight into how difficult life can become when an economic squeeze arrives.

Floating the free kindy idea is very much part and parcel of the political re-set which the Premier sought last week with her Cabinet reshuffle.

It was a rare move for a leader who has only resorted to the refresh button a handful of times in her eight years at the state’s helm and indicates there is internal recognition that this government needs to reinvigorate itself.

Cost-of-living measures provided by the government are very much needed and will be appreciated by struggling Queenslanders.

But they must be complemented by a hardheaded approach to the “macro’’ problems which ordinary Queenslanders are focused on.

Those problems include both a chaotic health system, especially when it comes to regional maternity services which are in serious crisis, and the increasing threat posed by juvenile crime.

GOOD WORK DESERVES PROPER RECOGNITION

Queensland police cop their share of criticism so we should also acknowledge it when they show diligence and determination in performing their duties, and come up with some stunning success stories.

Detectives from the State Drug Squad seized just over $23m of cannabis from a property at Coominya, in the Somerset Region, on May 15.

The massive growing operation in Coominya involved 19 greenhouses each measuring 70 metres in length, which would suggest it could be swiftly identified.

Yet such infrastructure is not unusual in agricultural precincts, and police deserve credit for gathering the sort of intelligence which led to the uncovering of such a huge illegal operation.

Queensland Police were also acting in a wider drama when they made the seizure.

It was part of Operation Victor Alon, established to investigate an alleged national drug syndicate facilitating the commercial production and distribution of cannabis across Queensland, Victoria, NSW and the Northern Territory.

The hard slog of old-fashioned police work clearly continues, and continues to have positive results.