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One in ten children still missing out on early learning, advocates say

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Freya Lucas

Mar 6, 2025

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A group of key early learning advocates, service providers, children's advocate peak bodies and New South Wales social services leaders recently urged the Federal Government to include solutions to the non-financial barriers to early learning in its broader agenda for a universal early learning system in Australia.

Signatories to the joint letter calling for change were:

Uniting NSW.ACT
Goodstart Early Learning
NSW Council of Social Services (NCOSS)
The Hive
The Front Project
Guardian Childcare & Education
Nido Education
Early Childhood Management Services (ECMS)
UnitingCare Australia
Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth (ARACY)
Children and Young People with Disability Australia (CYDA)
SNAICC – National Voice for our Children
The Parenthood

While guaranteed subsidies and the removal of the Activity Test have been welcomed, the advocates used a joint letter to warn that approximately one in ten children are currently missing out on early learning due to a range of non-financial issues and practical barriers to access.

Families experiencing disadvantage, families from culturally and linguistically diverse communities, First Nations families and children living with a disability are those most likely to be affected by non-financial barriers to early learning, despite being the children who stand to benefit the most from access and participation.

“No child should be denied the life-changing opportunity to participate in high quality early childhood education and care yet too many face barriers beyond cost that limit their access,” The Parenthood CEO Georgie Dent said.

“To achieve true universality, we must remove obstacles like transport challenges, cultural barriers and system complexity. Ensuring equity in participation in high-quality ECEC is the most powerful lever to arrest, rather than entrench, disadvantage and inequity."

Fellow signatory Gretchen Young, Executive Director of Programs at SNAICC – National Voice for our Children said that while the Government's decision to eliminate the Activity Test is a positive move for families, there are still non-financial barriers that prevent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from enrolling in early childhood education and care (ECEC) services.

“Issues such as transport, food security, housing, health, geography and many others all impact on many families’ ability to access ECEC,” she said.

"Closing the Gap begins with our children, and that means ensuring they have better access to culturally safe, high-quality ECEC services. This is essential for preparing them for school and helping them thrive during those critical early years.”

The call has been supported by new data analysis from Uniting NSW.ACT identifying the Top 10 Federal electorates across Australia where there are children missing out on early learning enrolment because of non-financial barriers and where the support of a system navigator program would have the most impact.

These are communities where there is at least one local high-quality early learning service and at least 40 children aged between four and five years who are not attending any form of early learning or primary school (as per the 2021 census).

For example, in the Federal electorate of Blaxland, in south-west Sydney, over a quarter of (or one in four) children aged between four and five years (1,550 children) are not attending early learning.

“This new data shows where exactly there are families and children missing out on the enormous benefits of early learning,” Director of Impact and Innovation at Uniting NSW.ACT Tamara Pararajasingham said.

“The good news is that we have a viable and localised solution to this problem which compliments the significant reforms announced just a few weeks ago. We firmly believe that a system navigator program in the communities where it is needed, along with three days of guaranteed subsidised early learning is what it is going to take to ensure all children get to thrive and flourish and be ready to start school.”

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