Education Minister Jo Hersey announces ‘overhaul’ of childcare centre monitoring after Ebony Thompson’s death
After the hanging death of little Ebony at her childcare centre, an insider warns authorities’ soft approach to safety standards has left parents in the dark and put kids at risk.
A soft approach to enforcing safety and education standards in Northern Territory childcare centres has left parents in the dark and put kids at risk, insiders warn.
On Tuesday, The NT News revealed the Humpty Doo Community and Child Care Centre and three childcare workers had been charged with breaching the national education and care services following the death of 22-month-old Ebony Thompson.
An inquest found the Territory toddler was left unsupervised for 10 minutes in the playground, and was found by staff unresponsive, unconscious and turning blue while hanging between the loops of a hip-high gate on August 31, 2023.
The toddler died two days later from a severe hypoxic brain injury.
The rural childcare centre and three nominated supervisors – including director Rachel Lee Marsh and the acting director of the centre – were charged with inadequately supervising children and failing to protect children from harm or hazards.
Following the charges, Education Minister Jo Hersey announced she was planning to “overhaul” the regulator, Quality Education and Care NT, with a greater focus on punitive approaches for services that failed to meet the National Quality Standards.
“Childcare centres need to be held accountable, and I will not hesitate to take action against providers who do not meet National Quality Standards,” Ms Hersey said.
Ms Hersey said these plans included threats to pull funding from centres not meeting National Quality Standards.
However at the time of Ebony’s death, the Humpty Doo centre was “meeting” all the national quality standards, based on a review three years earlier.
It was only after her death the centre received a failing grade for five of the seven national targets, including children’s health and safety, educational programs and practice, physical environment, relationships with children, and governance and leadership.
An education sector insider said this was not an issue of the national childcare regulations being broken, rather that a culture of enforcement had been missing in the Territory.
The education worker – who spoke on the condition of anonymity – said there was previously no appetite to pursue fines or penalties even against services with repeated non-compliance issues.
They said educational approaches, where providers are assisted to improve practices, only worked if the service was “willing and able to comply”.
They alleged there were providers who knew the rules, were able to meet the standards, but “preferred profit over the health, safety and wellbeing of children”.
During the inquest, QECNT director Katy Brennan confirmed there had been a “pattern” of supervision issues from the Humpty Doo centre over four years, yet this did not trigger a review of its NQS rating.
In the 13 years since the introduction of the National Quality Standards, not a single centre nor individual in the NT has been fined for any breaches of standards, with only one outside school hours service temporarily closed until standards were improved.
The charges against Humpty Doo and the three workers are understood to be the first in the Territory’s history.
The education insider said a focus on increasing the percentages of services listed as “meeting” the national standards had previously skewed the regulator’s focus.
They said there was a culture of not reviewing services who had previously ‘passed’ their inspections – leaving them without a review for up to five years.
They said the department instead focused on bringing centres with failing grades up to the baseline standards.
The education insider said this could result in providers with substandard service and a significant compliance history coasting by while publicly listed as holding a “meeting” or “exceeding” rating.
The insider said even when compliance and monitoring inspections flagged significant issues at a provider, this did not necessarily trigger a more comprehensive review of its NQS rating.
They said this meant there were providers parents were comfortably dropping their children off at each morning, unaware the regulator knew it had “unsafe” standards.
The insider has welcomed the Education Minister’s push for greater enforcement against providers and not to “hide” the compliance issues.
Ms Hersey was asked if the Education Department would shift its enforcement culture to a more punitive approach, including pursuing fines and shutdown notices, and publishing notices against non-compliant services.
A spokesman for Ms Hersey said she wanted to speak with Ebony’s family before confirming any specific announcements in the coming weeks.
The coroner’s recommendation for QECNT to increase its enforcement of supervision audits, blind spot and fence monitoring comes as the department’s budget has shrunk.
In the 2025-26 budget, the early childhood education and care services funding dropped by $4.47m, primarily due to Commonwealth programs ending.
The Territory previously had a history of not publicly listing non-compliance warnings, however over the past 12 months seven providers have been named and shamed on the national enforcement action register.
There have been 10 enforcement notifications against Territory childcare centres dating back to mid-2018 – five of them were released in October 2025 alone.
While some have welcomed the push for stricter enforcement, industry sources have voiced their frustration.
An anonymous Darwin centre director said she had waited waiting years between assessments and ratings, causing immense stress for providers and families.
She said the process of ratings had shifted from support from the department to punishment.
“They used to be more helpful, now it is just punitive,” the centre director said.
The director also said there was a perception among smaller, not-for-profit centres that the regulator unfairly “goes after them” as they are “an easy target”.
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Originally published as Education Minister Jo Hersey announces ‘overhaul’ of childcare centre monitoring after Ebony Thompson’s death
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