Towards coherent care and education support policies for New Zealand families.

• Author: Adema, Willem

Abstract

The reconciliation of work and family life involves two aspirations that are important both to individuals and to societies: to participate fully in the labour market, generating income but also seeking individual fulfilment, and to provide the best for one's own children, giving them the care and nurturing they need. These aspirations need not be mutually exclusive, but many parents have difficulty in achieving their preferred balance of work and care commitments. Public policy does help New Zealand families to find a better work-family balance, and New Zealand holds up well in comparison to many other OECD countries. However, there are weaknesses in the existing New Zealand early childhood policy set-up, and this paper explores some of the relevant issues and ensuing challenges: to enhance an integrated early-years care and education strategy that is coherently pursued across different public agencies; to ensure equity in access to high-quality early childhood services; and to develop a comprehensive out-of-school-hours care system (or OSCAR services) in New Zealand.

INTRODUCTION

The avowed policy objective of providing care and education supports to families in all OECD countries is to support families in making their work, care and education choices. There are many other reasons for public policy to invest in care, education and employment supports, such as enhancing child development, stimulating economic growth, fostering gender equity and reducing child poverty.

Given the importance of these different objectives and the wide-ranging potential consequences of work-life conflict, it is not surprising that many OECD countries have made considerable investment in policies that increase work, care and education choices for families (households of one or more adults living together and taking responsibility for the care and rearing of one or more children). Nevertheless, there are not many OECD countries that have developed a comprehensive work and family policy for parents with children of all ages. Rather, many countries, including New Zealand, have over time introduced different individual support measures (operated by different agencies), without these necessarily being linked. As a result, in these countries there is little thinking about what the complete set-up of (possibly conflicting) policy measures taken together is trying to achieve. Moreover, since systems are built up piecemeal, there are almost inevitably gaps in support for families which limit families' choices and thus affect child development, education and labour market patterns.

After a concise overview of work and family objectives, support systems and outcomes in selected OECD countries, this paper looks at some particular aspects of the existing New Zealand early childhood policy set-up. It considers the different emphases in policy objectives among different public agencies, and explores why design flaws contribute to some policies falling short of achieving their objectives. Even though New Zealand does not score at all badly in international comparison, the paper finds there are some notable shortcomings in the New Zealand early childhood support model, and outlines some areas for possible policy development.

A CONCISE OVERVIEW OF POLICY OBJECTIVES, OUTCOMES AND SUPPORT SYSTEMS IN OECD COUNTRIES

Public policy in OECD countries aims to enhance the wellbeing of families by increasing their choice in finding their preferred work, family and education outcomes. However, increasing choice means different things in different countries, relating to the different reasons for public investment in family-support policies. These include enhancing equity among different income groups, family types, and men and women; promoting child development; improving school performance; addressing fertility concerns underpinning economic growth; ensuring the future labour supply; and supporting the financial sustainability of social protection systems. The emphasis on these policy objectives and the intensity with which they are pursued varies from country to country and within countries from agency to agency. Apart from national differences in prevailing political philosophies, differences in emphasis on policy objectives are also related to demographic trends and are otherwise path-dependent. For example Swedish childcare policy, which was initiated in the late 1960s, is in a much more advanced stage than in the United Kingdom, where this issue only came to the fore during the late 1990s.

Broadly speaking, prevailing policy objectives in OECD countries can be categorised into five (non-mutually exclusive) broad groups, as follows. (2)

* In all countries, increasing female employment is emphasised as being crucial for maintaining economic growth and a manageable pension system. These objectives are particularly important in Australian, British, Canadian, Irish, Netherlands, Portuguese and Swiss policy debates.

* Because of the (perceived) difficulty with reconciling work and family commitments, some people do not have children, or not as many as otherwise desired, while some parents have the number of children they desire, but by taking time out to provide personal care to their children risk compromising their career. These constraints contribute to there being both too few babies and too little employment. Fertility concerns are arguably the most important policy driver in Japan, which is not surprising in view of a (still declining) total fertility rate of 1.3 children per woman. (Future) labour supply concerns also feature in the policy debate in Nordic countries, and to a lesser extent in Australia, Austria and Switzerland. (3)

* Apart from in Nordic countries and Portugal, gender equity objectives appear to be incidental rather than serving as primary policy objectives.

* Child development is receiving increasing prominence in most OECD countries, but with different consequences. Tackling child poverty is an important policy objective in all OECD countries, and has been the key driver of British policy reform since the late 1990s. Promoting maternal employment is an effective way of increasing family incomes and reducing the risk that children grow up in poverty, which has a significant negative effect on child development (e.g. Maloney 2004). In Nordic countries and New Zealand, childcare policy stresses the pedagogic role of pre-school care. However, whereas early childhood policy in Sweden and New Zealand has been embedded in education policy set-ups, this is not so in most OECD countries including Denmark and Finland.

* In all OECD countries, investment in education helps people of all ages (4) to pursue the education profile that suits them, achieve their individual potential and fulfil their aspirations. Investment in skills and human capital, knowledge creation and diffusion are increasingly important drivers of innovation, sustainable economic growth, social wellbeing and societal development as a whole.

The different policy objectives that underlie public support for families often reinforce each other, but there can also be tensions between them. A childcare policy that is purely designed to facilitate parents to engage in paid work may not necessarily enhance cognitive development among children or improve their school performance later on in childhood. Alternatively, an early childhood education system does not generally involve enough hours to allow parents to hold a full-time job without supplementary care arrangements. Parental leave policy also embodies tension between different policy objectives. Policies that allow prolonged periods out of work facilitate providing personal parental care for children, but involve reduced family resources and thus put child development at risk, as well as limiting parents' ability to achieve their labour market potential and personal wellbeing. By contrast, a system that grants six months of leave to each parent fosters personal care for infants for one year, without this harming either parent's employment prospects and future earnings.

A Continuum of Care, Education and Work Support for Families in Nordic Countries and France

Only a few OECD countries have built a comprehensive care and education policy for families. In cross-country comparisons, Nordic social policy models generate strong labour participation among men and women regardless of household status (Annex Table A1), and the relatively high female (and maternal) employment rates over 70% have contributed to less than 4% of families living in poverty (Annex Table A2). Public support for reconciliation of work and family life has also kept overall fertility rates from plunging to very low levels: parents have realistic options to plan for family choices.

There are significant differences between individual Nordic countries, (5) but the models provide extensive family support leading to high participation in early childhood services (Table 1). There are substantial child allowances, and considerable fiscal support for families in France (Adema and Ladaique 2005), while generous paid parental leave arrangements in Nordic countries are available for at least a year. Policy also provides affordable high-quality early childhood services and extensive out-of-school-hours services (better known as OSCAR services in New Zealand) around primary school (until age 12), while France has a comprehensive system of "Maternelles" that allows parents with children aged three and over to engage in paid work on a full-time basis (see below). Public childcare support is considerable: the average parental fee in Sweden is the lowest across the OECD area as it amounts to only 11% of the cost of a childcare place (compared to 20% in Finland and around 25% in Denmark). The Swedish model also entitles parents with pre-school-aged children to reduce working hours by 25%: 45% of the Swedish mothers with children aged three to six years are...