VIC: Childcare costs up 30 per cent: ACTU

AAP General News (Australia)
04-07-2004
VIC: Childcare costs up 30 per cent: ACTU

MELBOURNE, April 7 AAP - The cost of childcare has risen by 30 per cent in the past
two years, putting extra pressure on struggling families, the ACTU said today.

ACTU president Sharan Burrow said analysis of Australian Bureau of Statistics figures
showed childcare prices were increasing at five times the rate of inflation and putting
pressure on the growing numbers of families where both parents worked.

Ms Burrow urged Prime Minister John Howard to address the skyrocketing cost of childcare
when he announces the government's new $350 million early childhood strategy today.

Both parents now worked in more than 60 per cent of Australian families, she said,
making childcare a major cost in their weekly budgets.

"The shift in families towards both parents working is a big cultural change that the
federal government is ignoring," she said.

"Families need affordable high quality childcare, but the government has failed to
respond to the big price rises in childcare fees that have occurred over the past two
years."

The ACTU would push for affordable high quality childcare as part of its campaign for
balance between work and family, she said.

Ms Burrow said the union would push for family friendly workplace amendments when it
took its family test case to the Australian Industrial Relations Commission in June.

AAP apw/gfr/cmc/jlw

KEYWORD: FAMILY ACTU

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