Early childhood educators do amazing work every day, and prioritise keeping children in their care happy, and safe. Governments across Australia are introducing new reforms to make early childhood education and care services even safer.
One of these reforms is the National Early Childhood Worker Register. It is a secure national database that helps regulators to ensure the people caring for your child at education and care services are qualified and safe.
What is the Register?
It is a national system that brings together important information about people working in early childhood education and care services. This helps regulators and services to keep children safe and give families peace of mind.
Why is it important?
The register will:
- make sure the people have the right qualifications and safety checks
- give regulators up-to-date information so they can act quickly if needed to respond to risk
- build confidence for families that safety standards are being met by services
What information does it include?
The Register captures information that services already collect including:
- name and contact details
- role at the service and where they work
- qualifications (including whether they are actively working towards a qualification)
- training, such as first aid
- Working With Children or Vulnerable People Check details or teacher registration details (if relevant).
How does it keep children safe?
Regulators will use the register to:
- check qualifications and safety checks
- see where people are working
- spot patterns that might indicate a risk
- make informed decisions if concerns are raised.
What’s next?
Future updates to the register may include:
- stronger identity checks
- links to other child safety systems like reportable conduct systems
- more information to help services with safe recruitment
- registration or licencing of educators and recording of their ongoing training, and professional learning.
Any future updates will need to be agreed by all Governments.
Do families need to do anything?
No. The Register works quietly in the background to keep children safe.
If you ever have questions about who is caring for your child, speak directly with your service.