Police charge two female daycare workers over alleged assault of toddler

A ban on men working in childcare has been ruled out by federal Education Minister Jason Clare, as two female daycare staff are charged with assault.

The Start Strong Early Learning Centre in South Wentworthville in western Sydney.

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Two childcare workers have been charged with allegedly assaulting a toddler in a daycare centre in Sydney’s west, in the latest scandal over child safety.

NSW Child Abuse Squad detectives received reports of bruising injuries to a 17-month old child at the Start Strong Early Learning Centre in South Wentworthville earlier this year.

Police issued two women Future Court Attendance Notices on Tuesday, charging a 42-year-old woman with assault occasioning actual bodily harm and common assault, and a 32-year-old woman with common assault. Both women will appear in Blacktown Local Court on August 27.

A NSW Police spokesperson confirmed that both employees’ working with children checks have been revoked so they can no longer be employed.

The childcare centre – which has CCTV cameras installed – declined to comment when contacted by The Australian.

Two more childcare workers have been charged over allegations of abuse. Picture: iStock

The latest charges follow the arrest of Melbourne childcare worker Joshua Dale Brown, 26, on 70 charges of alleged sexual abuse against eight babies and toddlers at a childcare centre in Point Cook between April 2022 and January 2023.

Police allege Mr Brown had worked in 23 different childcare centres since 2019.

The Victorian Health Department has asked families to test 2000 children who attended the centres for sexually transmitted diseases, after police expanded the list of centres from 20 to 23.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare said the company that operates the newly named centres, Affinity Education, should have known from the start where Mr Brown had worked.

“Think about the anxiety that mums and dads are going through today,’’ he said on Wednesday.

“Think about the trauma that kids are going to have to go through with all that testing.

“The company that runs those centres should have known where this bloke was and when he was working there.’’

Victoria Police have blamed the lack of a central register of childcare workers for delays in verifying where Mr Brown worked. “A key focus of the investigation has been establishing a complete work history for Brown,’’ police said in a statement.

“This has been extremely complex due to the lack of centralised records available, requiring detectives to execute search warrants to obtain handwritten records, shift rosters and other critical information.’’

Mr Clare said on Wednesday that Victoria planned to add childcare staff to its existing register of teachers “in the next few months’’, and he wanted all other states to do the same.

He said a central register would provide “red flags’’ for staff moving between centres “for the wrong reasons’’.

“There may be instances where people are moving from centre to centre because they’re being quietly moved on,’’ he said.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare wants a national register of childcare workers. Picture: Nikki Short / NewsWire

Despite some parents boycotting male staff, Mr Clare ruled out restrictions on men working in childcare. “Just cutting blokes out of it altogether is not going to be the solution,’’ he said. “I don’t think there’s any example of any other profession in the country where it’s gender specific.

“If we’re serious here about making sure that our kids are looked after and they’re safe, just identifying one gender is not the way to do it.’’

Mr Clare said he worried that early childhood educators “are feeling like there’s a target on their back and they might not want to work here’’.

“We need good people in this sector more than ever,’’ he said.

Childcare operators have revealed they have now started scanning their centres for hidden cameras. A Victorian cleaner, Christopher Rankin, 35, was granted bail this month after facing court on charges of allegedly filming children using a camera hidden in the bathroom of a ­Mildura daycare centre.

Australian Child Care Alliance vice-president Nesha Hutchinson said some childcare operators were now routinely “sweeping centres for bugs’’.

“It needs to be part of an overall cyber security approach,’’ she said.

Major childcare chains Goodstart, G8 Education and Affinity have declared this month that they will start using surveillance cameras, although they cannot ­legally be used in nappy change areas or bathrooms.

Despite the public alarm over abuse allegations in daycare centres, Mr Clare ruled out extending taxpayer childcare subsidies to private nannies.

“That’s not something the government is considering,’’ he said.

“We want (childcare) to be affordable, we want it to be accessible, but most important of all we want our kids to be as safe as they possibly can be.’’