Frogtastic Kindergarten and Childcare Centre breached national laws and regulations

A complaint against a childcare centre, where the mother of a four-year-old was not called about an injury which ended in her daughter undergoing serious mouth surgery, has returned a damning result.

The mother of a two-year-old girl, who underwent surgery after being injured at a Bundaberg childcare centre, says she hopes a damning probe into the incident “has saved another child from neglect”.

It comes after a Queensland’s Regulatory Authorityinvestigation into the Frogtastic Educational Kindergarten and Childcare centre at Avoca found it had breached “national laws and regulations” in relation to inadequate supervision of children.

Naaz Ali first raised the alarm after she picked up her daughter Ruhee from the childcare centre on January 13 and was shocked to find her mouth covered in blood.

According to Mrs Ali, the mother-of-two was told at pick-up time that Ruhee had been hit in the face with a ball by another child, but she had not been called earlier to tell her about the incident.

On closer inspection, Mrs Ali found one of Ruhee’s front teeth pushed back and the other tooth badly chipped.

The frantic mother took Ruhee straight to the Bundaberg Base Hospital where doctors put her under general anaesthetic to remove the tooth that was pushed back.

CCTV later identified that another child had used a hard balance board to hit Ruhee in the face.

Mrs Ali raised several concerns about the way the incident was handled, and took her complaints to the Department of Education for further investigation.

The Department wrote to Ms Ali to inform her of the outcome, saying the investigation had “identified breaches of the National Law and National Regulations in relation to inadequate supervision of children and the requirement to notify the Regulatory Authority within the legislative time frames.”

While the department was not able to reveal the exact nature of the breaches, Frogtastic is now required to log their compliance which must be made available to anyone who asks to see it.

“There are confidentiality provisions within the National Law which restrict the information the department is able to disclose in relation to compliance action,” a Department of Education spokesperson said.

“However, the service is required to keep a record of their noncompliance which must include details of any compliance notice or compliance direction.

“This must be kept at the education and care service premises and be made available to any person upon request.

“The department takes all allegations of noncompliance seriously, and does not hesitate to take enforcement action against Approved Providers as necessary.”

Mrs Ali said she was thankful for the investigation, but had not received an apology from Frogtastic.

“They have given the childcare centre a chance to clean up their mess,” she said.

“I hope the investigation has saved another child from being neglected.

“I do not have trust in the centre, so Ruhee is going somewhere else.

“I still need an apology letter from the centre for Ruhee and myself.”

The NewsMail approached Frogtastic Kindergarten and Childcare Centre for comment, but no response was given by the deadline.