The IEU welcomes the historic announcement on 8 August that the federal Labor government will provide $3.6 billion to fund pay increases that will mean teachers in long day care centres throughout Australia will get a 15% pay rise above the current rate in the modern award – with 10% in December 2024 and another 5% a year later.
The pay increase also requires long day care centres to limit fee increases to parents to 4.4%.
The long day care sector provides quality early childhood education and care services to hundreds of thousands of children and parents all year round. Under the modern award, an experienced teacher in a long day care centre is currently paid $93,000 a year. The new top rate after the 15% increase will be more than $107,000. For this highly feminised sector, it’s a vital step towards closing the gender pay gap.
Sector-wide success
“This is an historic outcome of unions, the federal government and a group of 64 employers working together to lift pay and conditions across the long day care sector,” said Independent Education Union of Australia NSW/ACT Branch Secretary Carol Matthews.
“The education and care of our youngest children is important and indispensable work. These long overdue increases better reflect the valuable work of early childhood teachers in laying the vital foundations for our children’s development and lifelong learning.”
The pay rises, to be funded by the federal government, will help ease critical teacher shortages in long day care centres across the country. Early childhood teachers have been leaving in droves to take up roles in schools and other sectors where the salaries and conditions are substantially better.
Recognition from PM and Minister
In announcing the funding, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said to the media: “Unless we do something about wages in this sector, we won’t have a workforce. Early educators shape and change lives. We can never thank them enough for what they do, but we can make sure they are properly valued and fairly paid. Today our government is doing just that.”
Minister for Early Childhood Education Dr Anne Aly said: “Properly valuing the early childhood education and care workforce is crucial to attracting and retaining workers.”
Minister Aly joined the IEU for a roundtable in late 2022 (pictured below), during which members shared heartfelt stories with her about how low wages, intense workloads and workforce shortages were impacting their lives.
Strong start but more to do
“While these pay rises are most welcome, more work still needs to be done,” Matthews said. “The gap in pay and conditions between teachers in the early childhood sector and those in schools is still too big. Teachers are teachers no matter the age of their students, and we will keep fighting until there is equity between teachers in the early childhood education and care sector and those in schools.”
The IEU is currently discussing with the federal government how the funding will be distributed and the mechanisms to ensure the full increase in funding is passed on to teachers and educators as pay rises. It is expected this will occur through the proposed new enterprise agreement which will include not only the pay rises but other improved conditions aiming to boost workforce attraction and retention, professionalism and service quality.
The IEU joined with the United Workers Union (UWU) and the Australian Education Union (AEU) to access the supported bargaining stream in new industrial relations laws passed as part of the Secure Jobs Better Pay Act in 2022. The provision enables unions to bargain for enterprise agreements with groups of employers in a sector rather than in individual enterprises. The laws aim to address the long-term failure to properly value work in feminised sectors such as early childhood education and care.
“This outcome better values the work that teachers in long day care centres do every day,” Matthews said. “Long day care staff, children, parents and the community are all better off because of this decision.”
