Childcare leaders take a firm stand on child safety at roundtable discussions in Cairns
Queensland’s early childhood leaders have sent a message to predators — do not come here if you want to harm children — as the state’s Education Minister works towards a national registry.
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Calls for a national employee register for the childcare sector and mandatory child safety training for staff were heard at a crisis roundtable held in Cairns on Wednesday.
Following the meeting, state education minister John-Paul Langbroek said the “the whole sector” agreed change was imperative.
Early childhood leaders warned predators to stay out of Queensland after the meeting of peak bodies, which focused on improving child safety and fast-tracking mandatory training for workers as demands for urgent sector reform escalate.
Creche and Kindergarten Association chief executive, Dr Sandra Cheeseman, said anyone wishing to harm children should avoid the state.
“My main message is if you want to harm children, do not come to Queensland,” she said.
Mr Langbroek said the state government was in favour of a country-wide employee register, after police laid more than 70 charges - including rape - against 26-year-old Victorian childcare worker Joshua Dale Brown last week.
The roundtable also follows the launch of an independent review into the offending of pedophile Ashley Paul Griffith, who was handed a life sentence in November after pleading guilty to abusing dozens of children over a period of almost 20 years at childcare centres in Queensland and overseas.
Mr Griffith is currently appealing his sentence.
“We want to work on having a national register of education,” Mr Langbroek said.
The implementation of a register would be further explored at an upcoming roundtable in Brisbane in August, he said, which the federal education minister would also attend.
“We don’t want people to leave a state and go to another, as we’ve seen in recent news,” he said.
Australian Child Care Alliance president Majella Fitzsimmons, who also attended, said there was an urgent need for cultural transformation in early childcare.
“It’s important we look at early learning and the culture in our centres,” she said.
“It’s so important to provide adequate training for early learning educators to ensure the safety of our children for years to come.”
Goodstart Early Learning chief executive, Dr Ros Baxter, said families should speak directly with their education centres about safety measures and concerns.
“We want to foster open dialogue between parents and providers,” she said, adding there was no “silver bullet” to solve the problems facing the education system.
“This really is about a series of actions in working together, learning, listening and getting this right piece by piece to keep children safe.”
Queensland Children’s Activities Network chief executive Kylie Brannelly attended the Cairns round table representing the peak body for the outside school hours care sector.
Ms Brannelly said it was important the government recognised the difference between early childhood care and the after school hours care sector as it considered policy changes part of its child safety review.
“The OSHC sector typically don’t own their own premises because we’re working in collaboration with schools so we were able to speak to some of the regulatory differences, the differences in ages of children, the workforce dynamics,” she said.
“We’ve got a larger number of casual employees. And the statistic that I’ve heard recently is that in outside school hours care, about 20 [per cent of our OSHC workforce is male as opposed to perhaps only 2 per cent in the long day care part of the sector.”
Ms Brannelly said she was supportive of introducing mandatory child safety training standards across the sector, but wanted more detail on the proposition of using CCTV and banning personal devices.
She said no immediate concerns had been raised by her members on CCTV and mobile devices, but QCAN was still undergoing wider consultation.
“We definitely want to see strengthened governance around child safety and people who provide services better understanding their obligations.”
Ms Brannelly said while educator-to-child ratios were not on the review’s agenda, she was advocating for minimum standards.
“We don’t want to see any single staff services operating. And sometimes that happens if there’s only a small number of children, the provider isn’t viable to have more than one staff member.”
These discussions come after the state government’s new Queensland Early Childhood Workforce Strategy for 2025-2028, designed to deliver a “fresh start” for the sector.
This includes $9.15 million over three years for professional development, $7.4m over two years for leadership training and $12.7m to hire 29 new regulatory officers.
The Education Minister said cultural change was essential.
“We need to make sure staff are able to see things, say things and then report things,” Mr Langbroek said.
He also highlighted how predators could exploit childcare settings, even when staffing levels appeared adequate, and warned that complacency was dangerous.
While the government was considering CCTV and phone bans, Mr Langbroek cautioned against hasty decisions and centres acting independently.
“We don’t want knee-jerk reactions to something that’s happened in Victoria,” he said.
“Individual centres shouldn’t be doing it on their own because that could lead to real complications.”
He also said simple solutions did not exist for complex problems and authorities must weigh up potential privacy concerns.
On Queensland’s Blue Card system, Mr Langbroek said the state maintained strict standards.
“I’m afraid we can’t take any risks when it comes to children,” he said.
To ensure safety standards, the government inspected all 3300 Queensland childcare centres annually using 255 dedicated inspectors, he said.
The roundtable included representatives from G8 Education, Goodstart Early Learning, Australian Child Care Alliance, Queensland Children’s Activity Network, Family Day Care Association Queensland, Lutheran Education Queensland, Early Learning and Care Council of Australia, and the Creche and Kindergarten Association.
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