Auditing Preschools for Compliance with Incident Reporting Policies

Ms Joan Pereira asked the Minister for Social and Family Development regarding recent incidents involving intimidation, physical, emotional and mental abuse of young children in certain pre-schools (a) whether ECDA audits the compliance with the incident reporting policies required of all preschools; and (b) whether ECDA will look into cases of staff dismissals for potential abuse cases.

When the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) conducts unannounced licensing visits, it will check if preschools have clear processes in place to report serious incidents within stipulated timelines. ECDA also checks that the preschool complied with these processes. ECDA will take the preschool to task if they have failed to do so.

We do not require preschools to report cases of staff dismissal or termination because doing so does not get to the root of the problem. The termination of an employment contract can be due to several reasons, such as underperformance of the staff and not that they have broken the law. At the same time, employers do not always dismiss a staff; sometimes for compassionate reasons, they may choose to allow the staff to resign.

ECDA's chief concern is whether, in the interest of child safety, the former staff should be allowed to work in the sector. To address this concern, the law requires preschools to report all serious incidents to ECDA within a stipulated timeframe. The preschool has to do this regardless of how it chooses to discipline its staff. Where serious child mismanagement has occurred, ECDA will bar the errant staff from working in the preschool sector. ECDA's regulatory actions are therefore independent of the preschool’s decision whether to dismiss the staff and provides a stronger assurance for child safety.