The past fortnight has again delivered some very big issues for our early childhood sector, and we have continued to unpack these issues with our members and address these in our advocacy to the Department and other regulatory and Government representatives.
We recently conducted a survey to determine the impacts of the current COVID restrictions and lockdowns. Thank you to everyone who responded; this has provided me with interesting and important first-hand data to share with the Department and other Government representatives when advocating on your behalf.
In the two weeks prior to the survey being conducted, 66% of respondents had between 50% and 100% of children absent from the service. While most services have retained permanent staff, 51% of respondents have reduced staff hours and 42% of respondents have reduced staff hours by more than 50%.