New laws to ensure higher standards for childcare centres, kindergartens

SINGAPORE — From a new licensing framework that will offer longer tenures to pre-schools with a good track record, to tightened requirements when engaging external vendors for services, new laws were passed on Tuesday (Feb 28) giving the authorities more oversight of childcare centres and kindergartens.

The new Early Childhood Development Centres Act, which was introduced in Parliament on Feb 6 and debated on Tuesday, will see childcare centres and kindergartens come under the same regulatory framework.

Kindergartens, currently registered in a one-off process, will have to apply for and regularly renew their licences, similar to how childcare centres currently must renew their licences every six to 24 months.

And pre-schools must seek approval from the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) before engaging any third-party education providers — including vendors of ad-hoc enrichment workshops, cooks and cleaners — to ensure their “suitability of working with young children”.

A wider variety of penalties will also be introduced for errant pre-schools, ranging from shortening their licence tenures to fines.

Presently, the 1,300 childcare centres and 500 kindergartens here are separately regulated under the Child Care Centres Act and Education Act respectively.

Speaking in Parliament on Tuesday, Minister for Social and Family Development Tan Chuan-Jin said the new laws are aimed at ensuring “higher and more consistent quality standards” across the early-childhood education sector.

“Regulatory standards underpin the foundation of a good quality pre-school. The Early Childhood Development Centres Bill seeks exactly to be that strong and reliable base for the sector, to consistently provide good-quality programmes that give our young parents peace of mind when it comes to the safety, well-being and development of their children,” he said.

A longer licence tenure of up to three years will be granted to pre-schools with a good regulatory track record. Among other things, the ECDA will look at the centre’s physical environment, safety and hygiene, quality of its programmes and staff, as well as staff-to-child ratios in assessing licence applications.

Currently, eight in 10 childcare centres attain the highest standards and are placed under the maximum two-year tenure.

On the other hand, centres with poor track records will also be asked to pay a security deposit of S$10,000, as a form of “assurance ... on their commitment to improve”, said Mr Tan.

The new laws also give the ECDA more bite in investigating pre-schools that are alleged to engage in errant practices, such as powers to search the centres, interview people, take photos or video-record the investigation process.

Currently, the authorities are only allowed to inspect the premises.

And to ensure that enforcement measures for errant pre-schools are reasonable and proportionate to their offence, the authorities can ask centres to take remedial action, pay a fine, or shorten their licensing tenures. Currently, they can only revoke licences. Administrative lapses will no longer be deemed criminal offences, a change from the rules in the two existing Acts.

The new Act — which will not cover Ministry of Education kindergartens, enrichment centres and standalone foreign-system kindergartens — is expected to come into operation over the next year.

Thereafter, existing childcare centres will be licensed under the new Early Childhood Development Centres Act, while existing kindergartens have up to a year to obtain their new licences.

Thirteen Members of Parliament (MPs) spoke on the Bill on Tuesday. While they supported the new laws, some, such as Workers’ Party (WP) Non-Constituency MP Daniel Goh, Ms Cheryl Chan (Fengshan) and Mr Gan Thiam Poh (Ang Mo Kio) were concerned that centres may pass on the higher costs of compliance to parents.

Other MPs spoke of the need to ensure children from low-income families attend pre-school, with WP NCMP Leon Perera suggesting having incentives to reduce the absenteeism rate of these children, citing the Bolsa Familia grant in Brazil, where parents are paid to keep their children in school.

Responding, Mr Tan assured the MPs that the requirements have been “carefully calibrated” in consultation with pre-school operators, and are unlikely to result in higher fees.

The ECDA is also looking into asking centres to publish charges for field trips and supplementary enrichment activities, and to make such activities optional.

MPs also questioned why MOE kindergartens are excluded under the new regime, calling for “uniformity” across schools, with Dr Lee Bee Wah (Nee Soon) and Mr Louis Ng (Nee Soon GRC) asking the authorities to guard against “double standards”.

In response, Mr Tan said that MOE kindergartens, which are regulated under the Education Act, will be held to consistent standards of quality and safety similar to requirements under the Early Childhood Development Centres Act.

Operators whom TODAY spoke to welcomed the extended three-year licence for pre-schools that meet specified criteria.

EtonHouse International Education Group’s executive director Ng Yi Xian said: “This will give us more time to focus on quality standards. The new rules will also ensure more trained staff in pre-schools, which in turn will enhance the overall standards of the early childhood profession in Singapore.”

Dr Jacqueline Chung, senior principal at St James’ Church Kindergarten, said the new laws would provide kindergartens and childcare centres “clear markers” for quality education and care in the early childhood sector.

However, she urged the ECDA to consider exempting centres certified by the Singapore Pre-school Accreditation Framework (Spark) from the licensing regime, noting that Spark requirements are more onerous than the licensing requirements.