"We feel that we have failed in our role as parents, that we didn't do our job, we didn't protect her from harm.''
He said his daughter often woke up crying at night, was emotional, clingy and needed lots of cuddles from her parents.
"We are dreading the day that she reaches an age when she realises exactly what he was doing,'' he said.
"At her age now, she knows what he did was wrong but it won't be until she is older that she realises the extent of the abuse.''
In sentencing, Judge Emma Aitken said the offending began in April 2011 when the girl was nine, and continued on two subsequent occasions.
Lever had been drinking and using illicit drugs, and taking anti-depressants at the time of the assaults.
He indecently assaulted the girl five times over the three occasions, the latest on January 26 this year.
Judge Aitken said the two assaults on this date showed an escalation in seriousness of offending.
She said it had caused significant harm to the girl and her family.
"Really for this young girl the effects of the offending rather than decreasing over time may well increase once she is old enough to understand exactly the nature of what has happened.''
Judge Aitken sentenced Lever to 17 months in prison, taking into account his guilty plea, his genuine remorse, and that he had already taken steps to enter treatment programmes for alcohol abuse and his sexual offending.
Defence lawyer Michael Talbot had argued for continued suppression of Lever's name, saying it would cause hardship to his partner and children, and that there was only media interest in the case because of his employment at a school, which was unrelated to the offending.
Holly Brown, lawyer for the school, also argued in favour of continued name suppression, saying it could cause stress to children who recognised Lever's name or photograph, and that it would harm the reputation of the school among those who recognised him as being a former employee.
Judge Aitken said she was not persuaded that those factors overruled the presumption of open justice, and allowed Lever's name to be published.
However the names of his partner and children, his occupation and the name of the school where he worked were permanently suppressed.
