HAVING progressively raised the requirements of childcare workers Joy Burch has now had to create a backdoor into the industry.

“These changes will help services to meet the requirements under the National Quality Framework,” Joy said.

“While many of these amendments are relatively minor, they respond directly to feedback from the education and care sector and will resolve some issues that have been raised since the introduction of the National Quality Framework.

“The ACT Government has listened to the sector’s concerns about backfilling educators during meal breaks and unexpected leave. The amendments provide flexibility for staffing arrangements during these periods without compromising our children’s education or safety.

“We will also make it easier for services to employ new educators by introducing a probationary period for an educator to be employed while working towards their Certificate III in Early Childhood Education and Care.

“The amendments will also streamline the supervisor certificate approval process to cut red tape for services and the Regulatory Authority.”