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West Australian
07-08-2025
- West Australian
South Australia to ban phones, personal devices in childcare centres
South Australia will be one of the first states to ban the use of personal mobile phones in childcare centres. The regulations will be implemented across all childcare and early learning centres in an effort to strengthen safety and 'better protect young children across the state'. The South Australian and Victorian governments are among the first to implement the National Model Code, which includes the ban of mobile phones, tablets, iPads, and other devices capable of taking photos or videos, personal storage or files transfer. South Australia's Education Minister Blair Boyer said: 'The safety and wellbeing of our children is paramount, and we are working quickly to strengthen the safety requirements for long day care services and preschools.' 'All providers in South Australia must now ensure they have provided their policies and procedures to ban the use of personal mobile devices to our independent regulator. 'This ban is in line with changes recently announced by the Victorian Government and demonstrates our commitment to child safety.' As part of the ban, the Education Standards Board (ESB) will also conduct 'spot checks' across childcare and early learning centres to ensure the ban is being implements. ESB chief executive Ben Gramola said a large number of centres had already implemented the code, which was 'great to see' and highlighted a proactive approach that many in the sector were taking to address concerns. 'Services who do not comply with this ban may be subject to regulatory action including placing conditions on their service approval,' he said. predator help box All childcare and early learning centres will be required to provide assurance and a copy of the documents to the ESB before the end of September. Businesses that fail to adhere to the policy risk a fine of $50,000 or suspension. The move comes after urgent calls for childcare reforms following the alleged abuse of multiple children as young as five months at a childcare centre in Victoria. Joshua Brown, 26, is facing 70 child abuse charges including sexual penetration of a child under 12, producing child abuse material, and contaminating food with bodily fluids. He is alleged to have abused eight children at the G8 Education-owned Creative Garden Early Learning Centre in Point Cook between April 2022 and January 2023. New laws passed through parliament last week enable the Commonwealth to withhold the Childcare Centre Subsidy (CCS) on centres that repeatedly fail to meet standards. Childcare operators with a bad history will also be prevented from opening new centres, and parents will have access to information on whether a centre has been subject to conditions if it has had its CCS application rejected. The Coalition has called for further measures, including a national approach to Working with Children Checks and a national register of workers. Education Minister Jason Clare has said work on a national register is ongoing.
News.com.au
07-08-2025
- News.com.au
South Australia to ban phones, personal devices in childcare centres
South Australia will be one of the first states to ban the use of personal mobile phones in childcare centres. The regulations will be implemented across all childcare and early learning centres in an effort to strengthen safety and 'better protect young children across the state'. The South Australian and Victorian governments are among the first to implement the National Model Code, which includes the ban of mobile phones, tablets, iPads, and other devices capable of taking photos or videos, personal storage or files transfer. South Australia's Education Minister Blair Boyer said: 'The safety and wellbeing of our children is paramount, and we are working quickly to strengthen the safety requirements for long day care services and preschools.' 'All providers in South Australia must now ensure they have provided their policies and procedures to ban the use of personal mobile devices to our independent regulator. 'This ban is in line with changes recently announced by the Victorian Government and demonstrates our commitment to child safety.' As part of the ban, the Education Standards Board (ESB) will also conduct 'spot checks' across childcare and early learning centres to ensure the ban is being implements. ESB chief executive Ben Gramola said a large number of centres had already implemented the code, which was 'great to see' and highlighted a proactive approach that many in the sector were taking to address concerns. 'Services who do not comply with this ban may be subject to regulatory action including placing conditions on their service approval,' he said. All childcare and early learning centres will be required to provide assurance and a copy of the documents to the ESB before the end of September. Businesses that fail to adhere to the policy risk a fine of $50,000 or suspension. The move comes after urgent calls for childcare reforms following the alleged abuse of multiple children as young as five months at a childcare centre in Victoria. Joshua Brown, 26, is facing 70 child abuse charges including sexual penetration of a child under 12, producing child abuse material, and contaminating food with bodily fluids. He is alleged to have abused eight children at the G8 Education-owned Creative Garden Early Learning Centre in Point Cook between April 2022 and January 2023. New laws passed through parliament last week enable the Commonwealth to withhold the Childcare Centre Subsidy (CCS) on centres that repeatedly fail to meet standards. Childcare operators with a bad history will also be prevented from opening new centres, and parents will have access to information on whether a centre has been subject to conditions if it has had its CCS application rejected. The Coalition has called for further measures, including a national approach to Working with Children Checks and a national register of workers. Education Minister Jason Clare has said work on a national register is ongoing.
ABC News
08-07-2025
- Health
- ABC News
Klemzig early learning centre under investigation over storage of children's images
An Adelaide early learning centre is under investigation for taking and storing images of children's injuries and nappy rash, but police say no criminal charges have been laid. The state's Education Standards Board (ESB) chief executive Benn Gramola said the investigation began when they received a complaint "of inappropriate discipline" in early May from a parent whose child attended the Little Shining Stars Early Learning Centre. He said as part of that investigation, ESB officers found "photos taken of children in care to evidence nappy rash and minor scratches and grazes" at the Klemzig centre. "The concern with that is obviously we don't consider that appropriate," he said. "There's a small number of images that were identified as part of our investigation and the service is being proactive in helping us and being cooperative with us. "We believed this is a misguided arrangement or process to evidence injury or nappy rash within the service. We don't believe there is any malicious intent with this." The ESB seized those devices and referred the matter to SA Police, who Mr Gramola said found no evidence to warrant criminal charges. The ESB issued an emergency action notice and directed Little Shining Stars services to notify the families of each child enrolled during times when the photos were taken as well as engage a counselling service for the children and their families. It also directed the centre to reset all service devices and permanently delete the images. The centre was also ordered to amend their policies and procedures to ensure they were in line with national regulations. The ESB further issued emergency action notice to four other Little Shining Stars centres at Pooraka, Virginia, Wayville and Evanston regarding the practice of taking and storing images evidencing injuries. The ESB also said the service provider had terminated the employment of three female workers following the parent's complaint that children were being tapped on the head during nap times. The ABC has contacted the centre for a formal response. ESB chief executive Benn Gramola said the Little Shining Stars incident was considered "isolated". "I want to reassure families that children's safety remains our highest priority," he said. "I encourage staff, families, and members of the public to report any concerns or complaints about early childhood education and care services to the Education Standards Board." The ESB said the investigation was continuing and other regulatory action, including prosecution, may be taken when it ends. More money was invested in the ESB in 2023, which has seen service visits rise by 63 per cent on the previous year, and staffing levels double.
ABC News
24-06-2025
- Business
- ABC News
Crackdown on SA childcare centres finds 'half not meeting standards'
A crackdown on childcare centres in South Australia found half were not meeting national quality standards, a parliamentary committee has heard. Giving evidence in the budget estimates committee on Monday, Education Minister Blair Boyer and his department heads said $7.11 million in additional funding had been given to the Education Standards Board over three years. The funding was the result of a recommendation from the Royal Commission into Early Childhood Education and Care, and has allowed the board to more than double the number of compliance officers from 18 to 39 full time equivalents. Acting chief executive of the Education Standards Board, Sean Heffernan, told the committee that before the funding increase, some services had gone for up to a decade without being assessed. "There has been such a big gap between assessment and rating visits so where there has been a service that hasn't been assessed or rated potentially between eight or 10 years," he said. "What we were finding though was a large number of services at that time, given the gap between the assessment ratings, 50 per cent of those were receiving a 'working towards'." There are four rating categories under national quality standards: "significant improvement required", "working towards national quality standard", "meeting national quality standard" and "exceeding national quality standard". Mr Heffernan said the number of services receiving a "working towards" rating had dropped since the initial crackdown. "What we have done is introduce a pre-assessment and rating visit, which is around three months before their assessment and rating actually commences, which then determines areas of compliance or areas that might need focus," he said. "What that has done is reduce that significantly down to 17 per cent." But Mr Heffernan said 17 per cent is still above the national average of nine per cent. The committee was also told there had been an increase in childcare staff being banned from practising. In the 2023-24 financial year, three staff were issued with prohibition notices and two entered into enforceable undertakings. In this financial year, five staff were issued with prohibition notices and nine entered into enforceable undertakings. Education Minister Blair Boyer said that increase was also because of the increase in assessments. "The number of visits to early childhood education and care services increased by 72 per cent on previous years," he said. "With 2024-25 seeing a further 23 per cent increase on top of 2023-24 through increased assessments and ratings and introducing some proactive monitoring." Shadow Education Minister Heidi Girolamo said the numbers were concerning and asked for more details about which childcare centres the action related to. "It's one thing to be able to go through and do these assessments," she said. "It's the next steps that are important to make sure these childcare centres are given enough support to make sure that they can make these improvements to make sure children are kept safe," she said. Mr Boyer told the committee the Office for Early Childhood Development has a "quality uplift program" to help raise standards at childcare centres.
