The issue of pay emerged as the most important topic at last week's Community Child Care Cooperative (CCCC) Election Forum.

Forum attendees were addressed by Minister for Child Care Kate Ellis, the Shadow Minister for Child Care Sussan Ley and the Greens spokesperson for Child Care Senator Sarah Hanson-Young who all had 20 minutes to talk about their party's plans for the ECEC sector and then field questions from the floor.

The spokespeople all agreed that investing in early childhood education and care delivers a strong return on investment for both children and society more widely and that a high quality early childhood education experience can dramatically impact a person's future prospects.

Acknowledging the important role that ECTs can play in a child's education and the new qualification requirements all three of the speakers also said that ECTs deserve more pay.

Minister for Child Care Kate Ellis said wages were key to attracting and retaining high quality staff to the ECEC sector and said Labor recognised the need to secure long term wage increases and change public perceptions about the important role of ECTs.

She said the pay claim lodged by United Voice would deliver improved wages in the long term but said the Early Years Quality Fund would get money rolling into the sector in the short term.

"Early childhood professionals deserve professional wages and they deserve to be respected and we will work hard to ensure that is the case," she said.

She also said that despite media reports many ECTs are paid more than those on the award and that the Fair Work Ombudsman can help ECTS earn what they deserve.

"The Fair Work Ombudsman is conducting an audit of the early childhood education and care sector next year as a result of numerous reports about underpayment in the sector," she said.

Shadow Minister for Child Care Sussan Ley agreed that ECTs are underpaid and said that although the Early Years Quality Fund would deliver a short-term boost in wages she believed it was divisive.

"The money should be shared equally and we should not be increasing the burden of services by asking them to write EBA and grant applications."

She said the pay claim lodged by United Voice was the best way of determining how much the ECEC should earn and that boosting pay would have a positive impact on the availability of qualified staff.

Greens spokesperson on Child Care Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said government should commit to funding wage increases and that we can't rely simply on Fair Work Australia.

"We must fund fair wages and conditions and ensure ECTs are valued. We need to ensure the sector can attract the best qualified staff and better wages are the way to do that, no one can shirk that responsibility," she said.

Quality Changes
In addition to talking about wages all three of the speakers said they support the changes brought about as a result of the EYQF. Senator Hanson-Young said they EYQF was a great start but needed to be funded to ensure its future success:

"The EYQF needs more public dollars to ensure the success of the reforms in the long term and we need to support the sector in meeting the new benchmarks," she said.

Shadow Minister for Child Care Sussan Ley said the Opposition was committed to the EYQF especially with regards to the new ratios and qualification requirements but she said a review is required to see how well it is working.

"Some centres are struggling under the burden of additional paperwork and a lack of flexibility around the new rules and timelines and we want to look at how well the EYQF works," she said.

Minister for Child Care Kate Ellis said she is proud of the EYQF and said the ECEC sector has come a long way in a very short time but that there is still more to be done.

"We have made huge strides in moving child care from a babysitting service to a high quality ECEC sector that gives all kids the best start in life," she said.