One million families will soon benefit in child care cost relief as the Government’s early childhood education and care reform has been passed by the Senate. 

This means there will be more affordable, accessible and flexible services for families across Australia. 

Support will be available for people working the most, while earning the least. This will encourage more than 230,000 families to return to the workforce. 

The Jobs for Families legislation will also tackle rising child care fees and support early learning opportunities for children. 

In detail, the rebate cap was increased to $10,000 from $7,500 for families on incomes of $185,710 of less.  

The Government has slashed the red tape so services are now more flexible in hours. This means families are not charged for 10 or 12 hours of child care, while they only use four, six or eight hours of care. 

Furthermore, depending on the work, training, study or volunteering undertaken by the parents, the reform will allow 18 hours a week of subsidised child care. 

In addition, the Community Child Care Fund will provide additional support from the total of hundreds of millions of dollars for families in regional and rural areas, from disadvantaged backgrounds or with additional needs such as disability.