Child-care funding talks

Press, 24 February 1984, Page 4

Child-care funding talks

Wellington reporter Meetings were held in Christchurch yesterday, and will be again today, to discuss the financing of childcare centres. Problems have arisen throughout New Zealand but mainly in Christchurch and Auckland, since new criteria on how child care might be subsidised were introduced by the Government on November 1 last year. The main problem has been in programming the Social Welfare Department computers to make auto-

matic payments to the families receiving subsidies. The November 1 criteria excluded some families who until then had been receiving subsidies. Although it would have been inappropriate for some families to continue getting subsidies, the loss of subsidies created hardship in some cases.

A phase-out period was agreed to by the Minister of Social Welfare, Mr Young, in some cases, although few have sought transitional grants. Of the 2213 family sibsidies for child care paid by the Social Welfare De-

partment on January 31, only 53 were transitional grants. It was intended these transitional grants end on March 31, but Mr Young has agreed that some may be extended. However, because of differing interpretations about the transitional grants, and troubles over the new method of paying families the subsidy direct instead of through the centre as before, the meetings have been called in Christchurch between the Department and the childcare centres.