Are ECE services truly funded for only up to 6 hours in a day based on licensed child-places? Some people think so. Others say no, funding is per child per hour up to a maximum of 30 hours (Funded Child Hour: FCH).
In this opinion piece David Haynes shares the contents of an addendum to his 76-page submission on the 2024 Regulation Review into the Early Childhood Education Sector.
Funding by Child-Place No Longer Exists
David Haynes
October 25, 2024.
It has recently been brought to my attention that the Handbook still contains references to “child-place”. These should have been removed a decade ago when child-based funding, using funded child hours (FCH), replaced funding based on child-place.
As part of overall ECE strategy development, in September 2011 Cabinet agreed to develop a new funding system for ECE.1
In subsequent studies it was identified that the then current system of providing funding based on “child place” produced significant inequities in the allocation of funding:
“The result of child-place funding is that a child’s overall entitlement is determined by the number of providers they are enrolled with. A child enrolled with two providers can receive up to 60 hours per week of subsidised ECE; a child enrolled with one provider that has filled their child-places may share a place, meaning that they only receive 15 subsidised hours.”2
“Child-place funding is paid up to 30 hours per week per place. Providers can use a child-place to provide services to more than one learner (e.g. one learner can be enrolled for the morning and one in the afternoon). Under the child-place system, a learner can receive up to 30 hours of subsidy per week for each service they are enrolled with.”3
It was decided to introduce child-based funding to replace funding based on “child-place”.4
Whilst many of the wider aims of delivering better targeted funding never eventuated, meaning that a new funding system is still required, we did end up with a system based on FCH, not on “child-place”.
Chapter 3-A-2 of the Handbook, under the heading Funded Child Hours, currently states:
“FCHs are the hours for which a service may claim funding and are based on the hours a permanently enrolled child is enrolled to attend the service, or the hours a casually or conditionally enrolled child attends the service.”
The words in bold are in bold in the Handbook. Funding is based on enrolment and attendance. There is no mention of “child-place”
‘Child-Place” in the Handbook
Given that funding is calculated based on FCH, the Handbook should no longer contain references to the term “child-place”. This is not the case. There are many references to that term. For example, Chapter 2-2 under the heading ‘ECE Funding Subsidy’ states:
“The ECE Funding Subsidy contributes to services’ operating costs by paying for part of each hour each child spends in ECE, to a maximum of six hours per child-place per day, 30 hours per child-place per week (i.e. seven days).”
Chapter 3-A-2, under the heading ‘Maximum FCHs for the ECE Funding Subsidy’, states:
“Services are eligible to claim the ECE Funding Subsidy for up to six FCHs per child-place per day, to a maximum of 30 FCHs per child-place per week (i.e. seven days).”
As funding is now based on FCH, not on “child-place”, these quotes should read “per child” not “per child-place”.
There are many other references to “child-place” in the Handbook. None of them should be there. The retention of the term “child-place” in the Handbook is causing confusion.
Conclusion and Recommendation
The basis for ECE funding has changed from “child-place” to FCH. The Handbook contains many references to the term “child-place”. This is causing confusion.
All references to the term “child-place” in the Handbook should be removed.
Footnotes:
