A childcare place is created where the market will not build one

The Commonwealth expanded demand on a fixed date and 35 per cent of Australians live where supply does not exist. Its answer is to become a builder and landlord — a real departure, at a scale of about 12,000 places.

childcareA new or expanded early childhood service in an area with insufficient supply, delivered through the Building Early Education Fund draft compare across jurisdictions

1575 days elapsed
longest dependent chain

9 discrete steps
across 3 bodies

13% waiting on availability
scheduling or queue, not assessment

0 days saved by concurrency
vs. 1575 if run end-to-end

Where the time goes

Critical-path days only. Steps that run alongside others are real work but do not lengthen the process, so counting them here would overstate the prize.

third party	485d	Waiting on an external body outside the regulator's control.
assessment	480d	Someone is genuinely evaluating the merits.
applicant	400d	Waiting on the applicant to supply or fix something.
scheduling	210d	Waiting for a person or committee to become available.

210 of 1575 elapsed days are spent waiting for a person or a meeting rather than for a judgement to be formed. Removing that time changes no assessment standard and lowers no bar -- it is the cost of scheduling alone.

The process, step by step

Applies when: An area has insufficient early childhood education places and no commercial proposal is forthcoming.

#	Step	Who	Why it waits	Clock	Typical	Basis
1	The area is identified as underserved assessment An area where supply does not meet need, on the measure being used.	Department of Education (Commonwealth)	assessment	—	90 reported	—
2	No commercial proposal emerges assessment Whether a private or not-for-profit provider will build there unaided. after The area is identified as underserved 1120d slack	—	third party	—	365 estimate	—
3	Building Early Education Fund round registration Applications for capital funding to build or expand a service. after No commercial proposal emerges 940d slack	Department of Education (Commonwealth)	scheduling	—	180 published	—
4	Commonwealth builds, owns and leases the service decision only if triggered The Australian Government builds and owns a centre and leases it to an operator. Triggered when: No provider will build even with capital support, so the Commonwealth builds and owns the asset itself. after Building Early Education Fund round 820d slack	Department of Education (Commonwealth)	assessment	—	120 published	—
5	Development approval decision The ordinary consent process, unchanged by the source of the capital. after Building Early Education Fund round 640d slack	Consent authority (NSW council)	assessment	—	300 estimate	Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW)
6	Construction and fit-out application after Development approval 240d slack	—	applicant	—	400 estimate	—
7	Secure an operator application Find a provider willing to operate the service, including where the Commonwealth owns the building. after Construction and fit-out 120d slack	Department of Education (Commonwealth)	third party	—	120 estimate	—
8	Provider and service approval registration The National Law approvals, unchanged. after Secure an operator 30d slack	NSW Early Childhood Education regulatory authority	assessment	90	90 legislated	Education and Care Services National Law
9	Places available registration after Provider and service approval	—	scheduling	—	30 estimate	—

on the critical path scheduling/queue = delay not caused by the assessment itself

Proposed changes

Make the desert measure a trigger, not a research finding threshold ~180d
About 35 per cent of Australians live in a childcare desert and about 1.1 million have no service at all. The measure that establishes this is university research, and the response to it is a discretionary competitive grant round.

Sources

Mitchell Institute, Victoria University: about 9 million Australians, 35 per cent of the population, live in neighbourhoods classified as childcare deserts, defined as more than three children per place; about 1.1 million live in regional and remote areas with no childcare at all
Department of Education, Building Early Education Fund: $1 billion, comprising $500 million to build and expand services and $500 million for the Australian Government to build, own and lease services; about 160 centres and about 12,000 additional places
Department of Education, 3 Day Guarantee: 72 hours per fortnight for all eligible families from 5 January 2026

Something wrong here?

This page is wrong in some way -- every page like it is. If you have run this process, the most useful thing you can do is tell us which step took longer than we say and why. Edit data/processes/au-childcare-desert-supply.toml and open a pull request, or send us the correction.