This year the Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ment announced the Ear­ly Years Qual­i­ty Fund as part of its Nation­al Qual­i­ty Agen­da for ear­ly child­hood edu­ca­tion and care. There will be an addi­tion­al $300 mil­lion fund­ing to sup­port child­care ser­vice providers to pay a $3 per hour wage increase to Cer­tifi­cate III qual­i­fied edu­ca­tors. This offers a fan­tas­tic boost to the Child­care sec­tor and is a great oppor­tu­ni­ty for child­care providers to raise the stan­dard of care pro­vid­ed with­out incur­ring busi­ness costs. To find out whether you are eli­gi­ble to receive this fund­ing, please see the Gov­ern­men­t’s defined set of eli­gi­bil­i­ty cri­te­ria.

To access this fund­ing, wage increas­es must be includ­ed in an enter­prise agree­ment. Enter­prise agree­ments are work­place agree­ments made between employ­ers and employ­ees about the terms and con­di­tions of employ­ment. Changes made to these agree­ments must under­go an approval process with the Fair Work Commission.

At Swaab we are more than equipped to assist you with putting in place the right agree­ment to access this won­der­ful fund­ing ini­tia­tive. Employ­ment part­ner War­wick Ryan spe­cialis­es in enter­pris­es agree­ments. Because of our work in this indus­try with oth­er inde­pen­dent oper­a­tors else­where in the state we can assist you with imple­ment­ing such an agree­ment at a sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduced fee.

If you would like to repub­lish this arti­cle, it is gen­er­al­ly approved, but pri­or to doing so please con­tact the Mar­ket­ing team at marketing@​swaab.​com.​au. This arti­cle is not legal advice and the views and com­ments are of a gen­er­al nature only. This arti­cle is not to be relied upon in sub­sti­tu­tion for detailed legal advice.

Publications

More AI Slop in the Fair Work Juris­dic­tion: The Fight Back

In two recent cas­es both the Fair Work Com­mis­sion (FWC) and Fed­er­al Cir­cuit and Fam­i­ly Court of Aus­tralia (FCF­CoA) have…

NSW Build­ing (Approvals and Prac­ti­tion­ers) Bill 2026 Pass­es Parliament

The Build­ing (Approvals and Prac­ti­tion­ers) Bill 2026 (the Bill) passed through Par­lia­ment on Tues­day after­noon 4 August 2026. The Bill is…

AI Slop v Fair Work Com­mis­sion: The Scourge Continues

For all the talk of how extra­or­di­nary and trans­for­ma­tive arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) can sup­pos­ed­ly be, it con­tin­ues to be a scourge…

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Stra­ta com­mit­tee train­ing starts on 1 Octo­ber 2026

From 1 Octo­ber 2026, new and return­ing stra­ta com­mit­tee mem­bers must com­plete free online train­ing deliv­ered by NSW Fair Trad­ing. This must…

Michael Byrnes is quot­ed in the arti­cle, What does the FWC’s new AI guid­ance mean?”, pub­lished in HR Leader on 28 August 2026

The Fair Work Commission’s new AI Guid­ance Note intro­duces clear rules on using gen­er­a­tive AI in work­place dis­putes, with a focus…

Michael Byrnes appeared on the Lawyers Week­ly Show pod­cast with Jerome Doraisamy released on 27 August 2026 to dis­cuss work­place law, social media use, and gen­er­a­tional attitudes

“Work­place law, social media use, and gen­er­a­tional atti­tudes” explores how social media, work­place rights, and chang­ing gen­er­a­tional expec­ta­tions are reshap­ing…

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