Staff and students rally for child care

Michelle Brear, Sydney

The world's biggest teddy bear joined staff, students and kids at a 150-strong rally on November 11 at the University of New South Wales to demand that the university urgently act on the enormous childcare waiting lists at its Kensington campus.

Vice-president of the UNSW branch of the National Tertiary Education Union and Socialist Alliance member Susan Price told Green Left Weekly that the university must move to rectify its status as the least family-friendly higher education institution in the country. Price chaired the rally, which was addressed by newly elected NSW NTEU state secretary Chris Game and staff members George Agyrous and Laura Wilson, who are both parents with kids on the waiting lists at UNSW childcare centres.

The rally was organised by NTEU members in conjunction with students, and signatures were collected on petitions that will be presented to the university council and the vice-chancellor.

"There are currently an estimated 700 people on the waiting list for the existing UNSW childcare centres. By all accounts this is a conservative indication of the level of unmet demand", said Price.

"Our members are questioning UNSW's commitment to being a family-friendly workplace, because the paid parental leave provisions in the UNSW enterprise agreement are some of the worst in the sector. UNSW has said that child care is the priority, and to address this it commited to spending $500,000 in 2004 and $500,000 in 2005 on new childcare facilities. It is now November 2004, and nothing's happened."

[To sign on to the childcare petition, visit http://www.nteu.org.au/bd/unsw/childcare/petition.]

From Green Left Weekly, November 17, 2004.

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From GLW issue 606