COTA Australia is the national policy vehicle of the eight State and Territory Councils on
the Ageing (COTA) in NSW, Queensland, Tasmania, South Australia, Victoria, Western
Australia, ACT and the Northern Territory.
COTA Australia has a focus on national policy issues from the perspective of older people
as citizens and consumers and it seeks to promote, improve and protect the circumstances and wellbeing of older people in Australia. Our submissions always incorporate the views of our members developed through various consultation mechanisms.
The terms of reference for this inquiry focus on the role of childcare in facilitating
increased workforce participation, particularly of women, and in optimising children’s
learning and development. COTA’s interest is in the role that grandparents play in
providing child care for their grandchildren and to ensure that policy recommendations
take account of that role.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Survey of Child Care1 shows that 937,000
children under the age of 12 receive child care from their grandparents, which is around a quarter of all children and nearly half of all children who usually attend some form of child care. Grandparents’ contribution to child care is constant across the ages but there appears to be a definite preference for grandparents to provide before and after school care as they provide care for 425,000 children between 6 and 12 years of age, compared to the 237,000 children who attend formal before or after school care. 2
For this inquiry we put out a specific request to our members and other older people to
tell us about their experience in providing child care to their grandchildren. We received
responses from across the country and we would like to thank the people who took the time to give us their stories.
In this submission we look at why grandparents offer or are asked to provide child care
and why this form of care is preferred to formal care. We cover the importance of
workforce participation, flexibility, affordability and quality of care as these emerged
as the most important issues.
