Funding changes

The following funding changes should be considered by early learning services for their upcoming payments.

• Attesting to the updated extended parity funding rates
• 1 January 2023: Extended parity funding rates
• Changes to funding claims for an emergency closure
• Update to the attestation of certificated teachers’ salaries
• 1 January 2023: Parity funding rates
• 1 January 2023: 2.75% increase to all ECE funding rates
• Extending the minimum salary scale for certificated teachers
• Introducing the minimum salary scale for management positions

Attesting to the updated extended parity funding rates

If your service has already attested to the extended parity funding rates, the updated rates were automatically applied to your funding for payment on 1 February 2023.

Services that have not opted in yet can do so up until 31 December 2022 in order to receive a February payment for the new rates (applied from 1 January 2023).

The following is a guide outlining the key information for services who wish to access the updated extended parity funding rates.

Accessing the extended parity funding rates [PDF, 246 KB]

1 January 2023: Extended parity funding rates

The following tables set out the extended parity funding rates an education and care services would be able to opt in to from 1 January 2023.

All-day education and care services and hospital-based services 

Sessional education and care services and hospital-based services

Changes to funding claims for an emergency closure

What is changing?

From 1 October 2022, funding for an emergency closure can only be claimed for the hours that children have a permanent enrolment for the day of the approved closure. This is called the booking rule, whereby the emergency closure claim is made using the enrolled hours of children booked to attend that day of the week.

Previously funding claims for an emergency closure could also be made using the average of a service’s previous FCH claims. This is known as the averaging rule, whereby the emergency closure claim is made using the average of the last four weeks of FCH claims for that day of the week.

This change was prompted after an investigation found differences in how we described how services and SMS vendors could claim emergency closure funding. The booking rule was selected as it provides the most accurate reflection of a service’s funding claim had they not been forced to close.

Which SMS vendors previously used the averaging rule?

The information below shows what SMS vendors had been using the booking rule for emergency closures previously, and what SMS vendors had been using the averaging rule.

Booking rule:

• Discover
• HomeZone
• Infocare
• Juniorlogs
• MyChild.

Averaging rule:

• APT
• FirstBase.

There will be no change in the way funding for emergency closures are calculated if you use either of the Discover, Juniorlog or Infocare SMS applications.

Both APT and FirstBase have updated their system and will now be applying the booking rule for emergency closures.

Under what scenarios will the calculations be different?

The first table in each example shows what funded child hours would be recorded for the emergency closure under the averaging rule, while the second table shows what funded child hours would be recorded for the emergency closure under the booking rule, which will now be used by all SMS vendors.

Example 1: Increased FCH claim

In the below example, a service has claimed an emergency closure for Tuesday 4 October 2022.

Averaging rule

Booking rule

Example 2: Decreased FCH claim

In the below example, a service has claimed an emergency closure for Thursday 6 October 2022.

Averaging rule

Booking rule

The booking rule provides an accurate reflection of a service’s funding claim as it accounts for any recent changes in roll. It also limits the possibility of a service suffering a loss of ECE funding compared with what they would have received if they'd been able to operate on the date in question.

For an explanation on how to claim funding for an emergency closure, see Chapter 7-5: Emergency closure of the ECE funding handbook.

Chapter 7-5: Emergency closure(external link)

Update to the attestation of certificated teachers’ salaries

The attestation of certificated teachers’ salaries section of the RS7 return has been updated for the November 2022 funding round to allow education and care and hospital-based services access the extended funding rates.

The attestation will return to a single question, where respondents will indicate the range of salary steps they have paid their certificated teachers.

Only Education and Care and Hospital-based services are affected by this change.

You can find information about how to complete the new attestation in Chapter 9-6 of the ECE funding handbook.

Chapter 9-6

1 January 2023: Parity funding rates

The following tables set out the parity funding rates an all-day education and care services are able to opt in to since 1 January 2023.

All-day education and care services and hospital-based services

Sessional education and care services and hospital-based services

1 January 2023: 2.75% increase to all ECE funding rates

From 1 January 2023, there will be an across-the-board 2.75% increase to funding rates for all early learning providers. The increase in Targeted Funding for Disadvantage took effect from 1st March 2023.

Funding rate tables are detailed in Appendix 1 of the ECE funding handbook.

Appendix 1 – ECE funding handbook(external link)

Extending the minimum salary scale for certificated teachers

The minimum salary scale for certificated teachers has been extended to 11 steps from 1 January 2023.

Steps 1 – 6 of the salary scale will reflect the first 6 steps of the kindergarten teachers, head teachers and senior teachers' Collective Agreement 2019 – 2022 (KTCA). While steps 7 – 11 only reflect a partial salary amount in relation to the KTCA.

To continue receiving the parity funding rates education and care services will need to ensure that all employed certificated teachers receive at least the salary amounts for steps 1 – 6 from 1 January 2023.

Education and care services who pay all employed certificated teachers receive at least the salary amounts for Steps 1 – 11 + Management from 1 January 2023 will be eligible to receive the extended parity funding rates.

Funding conditions related to the application of this salary scale can be found in Chapter 3-B-2 of the ECE funding handbook.

Chapter 3-B-2(external link)

Introducing the minimum salary scale for management positions

The minimum salary scale for management positions were introduced from 1 January 2023.

Step K2, K3, K4

Salary from 1 January 2023 is $79,413.

As a condition of receiving the extended parity funding rates certificated teachers employed in a management position at an education and care service should be paid at least the K2, K3, K4 salary amount.

Information about the management position and other related funding conditions can be found in Chapter 3-B-2 of the ECE funding handbook.

Chapter 3-B-2

Last reviewed: 04 April 2024 Has this been useful? Give us your feedback