PARENTS are now paying an average of $233 a week for child care, a jump of more than 10per cent in two years, new Federal Government figures show.
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But the real cost is likely to be even higher, as these figures come from information collected in 2006 from more than 8000child-care centres around Australia.
More children are now attending child-care centres, the 2006 census shows. The number of children going to some kind of registered care has hit an all-time high of 801,060.
But although a small number of children - less than 3 per cent - spend the equivalent of a long working week, 50 hours, in child care, the census shows that parents still try to balance caring for their children themselves with professional child care.
The percentage of children attending long day care centres for less than 30 hours a week stayed almost the same: from 79per cent in 2004 to 80 per cent in 2006. Most of those children attended for less than 20 hours a week.
But the cost of care continues to rise, putting further strain on household budgets, along with climbing petrol and food prices and higher interest rates.
In 2004, parents were paying average weekly fees for long day care centres of $209. Two years later those fees had jumped by about 10.5 per cent to $233.
Family day care proved no cheaper. It also recorded an increase in fees from $185 a week in 2004 to $215 in 2006.
Less than a month ago the Federal Government's hefty increase in the child-care rebate came into force. From July 1, parents received a boost in the amount of money they received from the Federal Government to help with child-care costs, from 30 per cent to 50 per cent of their expenses.
The child-care industry is divided about the effects of that rebate. Many operators see it as an ineffective way of helping parents because it is a temptation to some centres to raise fees.
The not-for-profit child-care centres argue that the money - $1.5 billion a year - would be better spent on publicly funded centres and improving wages and training for child-care workers.
The Federal Government is aware of potential profiteering as a result of the generous increase in the rebate. The Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, wrote to child-care operators last month warning them they may be forced to publish their fees on a government-run website, to embarrass child-care centres so they do not push up fees unreasonably.
But the industry says publishing figures without any explanation - such as the location of the centre, quality of food, cleanliness, training of staff and staff-to-child ratios - would confuse parents.
Childcare Associations Australia, which represents private child-care centres, wants the Government to fund independent research into costs, arguing that people need to be better informed about the cost of child care.
