Shane Te Pou: Time to make early childhood education a public service

A community-based network of ECE providers would be cheaper and the focus would be on quality for the kids. Photo / 123rf

Early childhood education has become big business. The Government pours in $2.3 billion a year in subsidies, with families paying another $700 million. Incredibly, that means early childhood education costs the country nearly as much as the state secondary school system, and more than double what it cost in 2010.

Both Labour and National are jockeying to add more money. Labour’s $190m policy, kicking in from April 1, means thousands more families will receive ECE subsidies worth hundreds of dollars a week. National’s $250m plan would see families get tax rebates of up to $75 a week on their ECE costs.

But the fear’s got to be that all this extra money will just be swallowed up by a sector that seems increasingly driven by profit, not about caring for our kids.

The 30,000 ECE teachers and staff can’t be blamed for the cost of the system. On average, they make not much more than the minimum wage. Their total wage bill is only 40 per cent of the cost of the ECE system. Worse, the bulk funding of subsidies creates an incentive for for-profit centres to cut staff costs by hiring more inexperienced people.

But ECE can be provided at affordable prices. Community-based early childhood centres, like Kindergarten, Te Kōhanga Reo, Barnardos, Playcentre, and many independent centres around the country charge their families little or nothing.

For-profit providers, on the other hand, are charging hundreds of dollars a week. With the biggest for-profits making net returns of tens of millions of dollars a year, it’s attracted businesspeople seeking to maximise profits, and not providing a great experience for the kids. For-profits have expanded aggressively to capture more than 60 per cent of the market.

Families need ECE so that parents can work. There are not enough trained ECE teachers and staff to expand the number of places, and waiting lists in many areas are months, if not years. For-profits know parents don’t have the luxury of shopping around. It’s the old story: too much demand, not enough supply. It’s almost too easy for corporate ECE providers to up their rates.

Despite National’s claim they would “monitor” profits, there’s really nothing they can do to stop the providers sucking up all the taxpayer money that would be dished out in taxpayer rebates.

Early childhood education is an important public service and centres are community assets. Photo / 123rf

So, here’s the question: is it time to stop subsidising private companies’ profits and make ECE part of the public education system, like primary and secondary school?

As taxpayers, we’re already footing most of the bill. And it’s a bill that will just keep on getting higher and higher, while for-profit providers corner the market and make a mint.

It’s already effectively a taxpayer-funded system – so why not remove the profiteering middlemen?

What if the Government formed an alliance with non-profit community ECE providers, phased out subsidies to for-profit centres, and helped the community providers expand and take over from the for-profits?

We could establish a devolved, community-based network of ECE providers, a lot like what we had a generation ago. It would be cheaper, without having to pay someone’s profit. And the focus would be on quality for the kids, rather than making a buck.

Another benefit of a community-based, public ECE system is it creates another place for communities to come together and pool resources in times of crisis. Just like schools and marae have been the community centres, especially in small and rural towns, affected by the cyclone. (As an aside, how sad to see some commentators grumbling over the Government providing some money to help repair damaged marae when hapū and iwi are so quick to open the doors of those marae to feed and shelter people of all ethnicities during a disaster.)

The for-profit ECE system is a legacy of the period of neoliberalism where every public good was chopped up and divvied up for private profit at the taxpayers’ expense. The tide has well and truly turned on that kind of thinking now.

Instead, let’s see early childhood education as the important public service it is, and early childhood centres as the community assets they should be.

It’s time to end the status quo where our kindergartens and kōhanga reo have to hold fundraisers to pay for playgrounds, while private profiteers pocket millions from taxpayer subsidies.

Shane Te Pou (Ngāi Tūhoe) is a commentator, blogger and former Labour party activist.

This column is dedicated to my mokopuna, Ruby Rangimārie Jones.