The Australian Government’s Child Care Subsidy system was supporting the delivery of more subsidised care to children in the December 2019 quarter.
According to Department of Education, Skills and Employment data published today, in the December 2019 quarter:
• Out-of-pocket costs were less than $5 per hour per child for the parents of 72.1 per cent of children using the Child Care Subsidy in centre based day care.
• Out-of-pocket costs were less than $2 per hour per child for the parents of nearly 24.3 per cent of children using the Child Care Subsidy in centre based day care.
• The average hourly fee across all services (excluding In Home Care) in the December quarter 2019 was $9.95 an hour.
• The number of children attending approved child care was 1,339,970.
The Child Care Subsidy was suspended in April as the Government took action to provide hip pocket relief to families using child care and support services to make it through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Minister for Education Dan Tehan said the Child Care Subsidy would resume on 13 July.
“Our Government’s emergency Early Childhood Education and Care Relief Package did its job by keeping child care services viable while they provided continuity of care to the children of essential workers and vulnerable children,” Mr Tehan said.
“Our transition package is designed to support services to remain viable while they provide care to children as we ease restrictions further and get more people back to work. Stopping fee increases and relaxing the activity test during the transition will relieve financial pressure on families that may be doing it tough.”
