The Hon. Jay Weatherill: "Early childhood education should be a State responsibility."

If I have learnt something from reading to my daughters from birth – and more lately, listening to them read – it is that children are ready to learn right from the start.

Anyone who embraces reading to children right from birth can see those very first signs of learning and development right before their eyes.

It isn’t necessarily intuitive that reading to children from birth has such an enormous effect on their futures. But we now know that what happens in the first five years of a child’s life has the greatest effect on the child’s development.

In fact, that’s the simple philosophy behind educational approaches such as Reggio Emilia – which was developed by a teacher and parents in the villages of the Italian region.

It isn’t necessarily intuitive that reading to children from birth has such an enormous effect on their futures. However, I have embraced this philosophy in my own home as my girls have grown up.

I used it in education policy when I was Minister for Education and Early Childhood Development.

This year, it was the driving force behind an idea I raised in my address to the National Press Club in July. It is an idea that I believe has far-reaching social, budgetary and productivity benefits.

My idea is this: I think the States should have responsibility for the education of our children.

Childcare, preschool, primary school and secondary school – that is everything from birth to age 18 – should be taken care of by State Governments.

The Federal Government should be in charge of universities, vocational education and training.

This isn’t how it is at the moment – with early childhood largely the domain of the Federal Government.

State governments are heavily involved from birth to about age one through antenatal services, health checks and immunisations.

But if children are healthy and developing from age one to four, most of their contact is with Federal Government-subsidised child care and the occasional visit to the family doctor.

That gap in continuity is a real problem when you consider how critical the first five years are for our children’s development.

Splitting responsibility across two tiers of government agencies can be a source of frustration for mums and dads trying to decipher which level of government is responsible for their children’s care and learning.

The benefits of the change I am proposing are: clarity for the staff employed to care for and educate our children and clarity for parents about who they should turn to if they have questions about that care or education.

Importantly, having State Governments oversee birth all the way through to 18 also will ensure line of sight is maintained when it comes to keeping our children safe.

It will give us the opportunity to make sure that children identified as needing extra support will have that support waiting for them when they begin pre-school and primary school.

The current arrangements increase the likelihood of any learning difficulties deteriorating or becoming entrenched. There are some significant, long-term benefits that will flow from this reform that are not so obvious. One is cost saving.

The late Dr Fraser Mustard – a Canadian expert in early childhood development and a former Adelaide Thinker in Residence – put the importance of the first five years in stark financial terms.

Evidence shows that a person’s physical, neurocognitive and social foundations are well established by five years of age.

Dr Mustard said that every dollar government spends supporting the development of children saves between four and eight dollars over the longer term.

It will also increase productivity.

Education reform is profoundly important for the transition from the “old” to the “new” economy because knowledge industries need workers who are creative thinkers.

I believe this is the real productivity agenda for the nation – not a narrow focus on punitive industrial relations measures.

I put this idea for education reform on the agenda at the meeting of State and Territory leaders convened by the previous Prime Minister.

We now have a new Prime Minister who, as one of his first acts as the leader of our nation, moved Early Childhood back into the Education portfolio.

Incidentally, this was one of the first things I did upon becoming the Premier of South Australia in 2011.

I urge the Prime Minister to capitalise on this momentum and look seriously at these reforms. Every Australian, young and old, will benefit from better outcomes for our kids.

Do you agree with the Hon. Jay Weatherill?