National Quality Framework Review 2019 Commences

The Education Council has published details of the review (see previous blog post for background) and established a dedicated website. The Education Council is a subgroup of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) made up of Education Ministers from around Australia. The NQF Review will be led by the Early Childhood Policy Group, of the Education Council, with representatives from each jurisdiction.

The Terms of Reference for this review, which outline the scope of the review as agreed by Education Council, include assessing whether the objectives of the NQF are being met (i.e. section 3, National Law) and will consider possible improvements to the system, including:

• The most appropriate governance arrangements for the National Quality Framework

• Whether fees should be more closely linked to the cost of regulatory services, in line with best practice guidelines for cost recovery

• Any changes required from the recommendations and referred matters from the Improving Quality in Family Day Care program of work commissioned by Education Council that require legislative and policy change;

• Any changes required from the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse (Royal Commission), as they relate to the NQF and services regulated under the NQF;

• Issues emerging from the review of the Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority(ACECQA), commissioned by Education Council, where they are more relevant to this review.

• Any further important or critical issues which may emerge from consultation with the sector, if agreed by Education Council.

A number of matters are out of scope, including the NQS, see the complete Terms of Reference for more details.

The time frame of the review is as follows:

• Phase 1 - public consultation and then development of policy options in response to issues identified in consultation and issues being considered by governments. This includes development of a Consultation Regulation Impact Statement (CRIS) by the end of 2019. The CRIS will be used for further consultation.

• Phase 2 - public consultation on the CRIS in the first half of 2020, and then development of a Decision Regulatory Impact Statement (DRIS) by the end of 2020. The DRIS will contain proposed options and the rationale behind the recommended options. The DRIS provides input to the final decisions and recommendations made by Education Council.

For the purposes of the public consultation phase, an issues paper has been developed which seeks input in a number of areas: approvals, operation of regulation, public awareness of service quality, and compliance and enforcement. Consultation is being sought through a questionnaire and consultation sessions. However, there does not appear to be any mechanism for written submissions, as is the case with most other reviews.