The NSW government will open and operate 100 new long-day childcare centres to address demand if it wins the state election in March.
The centres are in addition to an existing government pledge to build 100 new preschools and have them operational from January next year.
In the private sector, long-day centres offer early childhood services for children from birth to four years old and operate between 7am and 6pm.
The announcement on Saturday from the Minns government will deliver the first publicly owned long-day childcare centres in NSW, providing 5,000 places for about 8,000 families.
Chris Minns expects many long-day centre locations to open up in Western Sydney. (ABC News)
Premier Chris Minns said the centres would be built on existing public primary school sites and in areas deemed so-called childcare deserts.
He said the government would “not be indiscriminate” about new locations and that he expected many to open in Western Sydney and regional NSW.
“The reality is, for us in New South Wales, if we want a productive economy, we want to make sure that we’re giving every family the opportunity to get ahead,” Mr Minns said.
“So many people are missing out and they’re missing out for the most obvious reasons [and] that is that after they have a child, they can’t get affordable child care.“
Prue Car says families are in desperate need of extended child care hours. (ABC News)
Deputy Premier Prue Car said families desperately needed the extended care hours the centres would provide.
“That will end the double drop off and it will make it easier for parents to get back into the workforce,” she said.
“It will also create an opportunity for high quality early learning as children transition into kindergarten and primary school.”
Funding guarantee for community preschools
The government will also extend the transitional funding period for community run preschools.
As part of the NSW government’s early childhood education reforms, the Universal Preschool Funding Program will replace the Start Strong arrangement from January 1.
According to the government, 10,000 families are missing out on the community preschool places, which are not-for profit.
“We have listened to the concerns of the sector, and we’ve responded to that by guaranteeing their funding for two years,” Mr Minns said on Saturday.
“That will freeze their funding at, at least, last year’s level.
“So that will give community preschools a funding guarantee that they will not go backwards while we work with them on how we can get more children into their high quality preschool.”
Carol Matthews from the Independent Education Union of Australia said preschools had been “extremely worried” about losing thousands of dollars in funding next year, and prior to today’s announcement had started to shed staff.
“Now obviously, this reprieve is really going to help, but nevertheless, there’s been significant damage done already,” the union’s NSW ACT branch secretary said.
While the union welcomed the election promise, Ms Matthews said there was “more work to do on the details of the model”.
“We want them [the NSW government] to sit down with us, and actually negotiate an outcome which would enable some sort of stability and security in staffing going forward.
“That means recognising the actual staffing needs of preschools.”