While the Albanese Labor government crow about increasing wages and subsidies for childcare, Mallee families are stranded in a childcare desert, with long waiting lists or – in some towns – no childcare service at all. Childcare is an essential service in modern, regional Australia – without it, young families will leave communities.

Mallee parents regularly contact me desperately seeking help in our childcare deserts. In the Wimmera and Southern Mallee there were 300 children on local waiting lists and 84 additional staff needed to meet the demand, according to data collected by the By Five Early Years Initiative in 2022. In many rural towns with populations of less than 5,000 people, there is no childcare service at all, so waitlists alone do not tell the tale of the huge hole that is hurting families. There is no waitlist for a service that doesn’t even exist. Childcare services rely on the passion and commitment of early learning staff – and a dash of luck – as government funding gaps prevent them from strategic development.

Wimmera families and councils have been left to fend for themselves. The current childcare funding model is broken. Services in Mallee’s rural towns rely heavily on cyclical and unsustainable Commonwealth subsidies. The Albanese Labor government must invest in the infrastructure to support new childcare centres and address crippling workforce shortages especially in our regions. Our children and their parents deserve better.