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Transitional arrangements

Updated information on transitional arrangements for existing licensees

The Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments are working together to ensure that the move to the new national system for long day care, family day care, outside school hours care, pre-Prep and kindergarten services is as seamless as possible. Queensland has continued to negotiate and has achieved a number of transitional arrangements that will further assist services to transition over time to the new system.

Existing Queensland licensees, licences and staff members of in-scope services were transferred from 1 January 2012 as follows:

A licensee under the Child Care Act 2002 (the Act) is declared to be an Approved Provider.
A licensed centre based service under the Act is declared to be an Approved Service.
A licensed home based service under the Act is declared to be an approved family day care service.
Any conditions placed on existing licences will continue in force on service approvals under the National Law, where they are consistent with the National Law. For example rest period conditions.
Current exemptions from compliance with the Act will continue until 31 March 2012 under the Education and Care Services National Law (National Law), or if the Approved Provider applies for a temporary waiver or service waiver before the date the exemption will continue until the application for a waiver is decided.
If a licensee has more than one licence in relation to the same premise, former licences are taken to be one service approval. For example, a licensee may hold two 75 place centre-based licences located on one site. This will transfer to one centre-based service approval for 150 approved places.
A person who was both -
- a staff member of a licensed service, or the nominee for a licensee, under the Act; and
- either a qualified director, qualified coordinator or qualified group leader under the Act (this includes someone who is working towards the qualification and is taken to be qualified under the Act)
were declared to be a Certified Supervisor and a declared Nominated Supervisor on 1 January 2012.
Existing services must notify the Department of Education and Training (the Department) of who will be the Nominated Supervisor for that service and the person must consent to their nomination.
Existing accreditation and rating levels determined by the National Childcare Accreditation Council must continue to be displayed by relevant education and care services together with a provisional National Quality Framework (NQF) rating of 'Provisional Rating - Not Yet Approved' until the first rating assessment is completed and a new rating is given to a service.
An application for a licence under the Act which was not approved before 31 December 2011 will be progressed as an application under the National Law from 1 January 2012.
A person operating an existing service in scope of the National Law that is not required to be licensed under the Child Care Act 2002 is a declared out of scope service (e.g. a vacation care service that is operating for more than four weeks per calendar year). A declared out of scope service must submit an application for ongoing service and provider approval, but is taken to hold a provider and service approval until 30 June 2012 (or until the application is decided - whichever is the earlier date).

The Department will issue Provider Approvals, Service Approvals and Supervisor Certificates as appropriate, by 30 June 2012. The Department advised all existing licensees in December 2011 of the processes and information that services need to provide to facilitate the transition into the NQF.

Educator to child ratios

The NQF educator to child ratios will be gradually implemented. Queensland-specific educator to child ratio requirements will apply for a transitional period as outlined in the table below.

Note that services providing education and care solely to children over preschool age (outside school hours care service) continue to apply a ratio of 1 educator to 15 children.

Centre-based ratios from 2012 to 2020
2012 � 2015	Ratio	2016 � 2017	Ratio	1 JAN 2018+	Ratio
0-24 mths	1:4	0-24 mths	1:4	0-24 mths	1:4
15-24 mths*	1:5	15-24 mths*	1:5	0-24 mths	1:4
>24-35 mths	1:6	>24-35 mths	1:5	>24-35 mths	1:5
>30-35 mths	1:8	>24-35 mths	1:5	>24-35 mths	1:5
36 mths <7 yrs	1:12	36 mths <school age	1:11	36 mths <school age	1:11
4 yrs <7 yrs	1:13			School age**	1:15
4 yrs <14 yrs	1:12
School age**	1:15	School age**	1:15

*Eligible services need to apply to continue using the 1:5 ratio from 2012 until 2018.
**Means a child enrolled attending/or will be attending in schooling (Prep onwards) in the same calendar year.

Until 2016 existing family day care services in Queensland may continue the current arrangements of providing care to a maximum of seven children at any one time (not including the educator's own children who are over preschool age). However, the maximum of four children preschool age or under can being cared for at any time still applies.

Under the National Regulations , the minimum educator to child ratios are calculated across the service - that is, the number of educators required is calculated based on all children under a single roof regardless of the room configuration. Visit our Calculating Ratio page for more information.

Qualification requirements

From 1 January 2012, the new national body, the Australian Children's Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA), will determine the qualifications to be held by educators including the assessment of equivalent qualifications. ACECQA will also publish a list of qualifications that have been approved for transitioning into the NQF.

There are also Queensland-specific requirements in Part 7 of the National Regulations to ensure that the intent of current arrangements is maintained until the new qualification requirements are gradually phased in from 2014. All staffing requirements will also be subject to reviews of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) Agreement in 2013, 2014 and 2019.

First Aid qualifications

The National Regulations provide that any person who holds an approved First Aid qualification under the existing Act is declared to have an approved First Aid qualification under the National Law from 1 January 2012 until the earlier of the following -

31 December 2012; or
the date on which the training or qualification is required to be renewed or updated under the Act.

ACECQA will publish a list of approved First Aid training institutions and approved courses, including anaphylaxis and emergency asthma management. Sections 136 (1) (b) & (c) and 136 (b) & (c) of the National Regulations requires services to have an educator trained in anaphylaxis and asthma management in attendance by 2013. Educators with approved training are taken to meet the requirements from 1 January 2012 unless their qualifications are renewed prior to 2013, whichever comes first.

Physical environment

All services need to consider whether relevant building code requirements apply in addition to physical environment requirements in the National Regulations and the National Quality Standard.

In order to ease the transition to the new requirements for existing services some physical environment requirements will not apply to some services. This includes services that were not required to comply with similar requirements under the previous legislation, unless the service's premise or family day care residence is renovated, the service approval is transferred or the family day care educator is no longer engaged at the service. These requirements relate to fencing and security, outdoor space, shade and the design of the premise to ensure adequate supervision.

In addition to these transitional arrangements, the National Law also provides for two types of waivers from meeting the physical environment requirements in the National Regulations:

Temporary waiver - for a period of up to 12 months
Service waiver - on an ongoing basis

For example, where a service is unable to meet a physical environment requirement of the National Regulations (e.g. fencing or appropriate shaded area), the Approved Provider could apply for a temporary waiver.

Services exempt from meeting a physical requirement under transitional or waiver provisions must display notification of this exemption at their service.

For further information about the physical environment requirements please refer to the Building Requirements page.

Information pack for existing services

Queensland licensees received an online login for an information pack in December 2011, detailing transitional information including necessary forms to be completed and sent back to the Department to enable a seamless transition into the NQF.

A sample of this online transition pack is available on the NQF Transition page.

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This page was last reviewed on 03 Jan 2012