Yesterday marked an important milestone in child safety reforms, with Early Childhood Legislation Amendment (Child Safety) Bill 2025 being introduced in the Victorian Parliament, on behalf of all states and territories.
Ensuring the safety and wellbeing of every child in early childhood education and care (ECEC) is a shared national priority. Governments across Australia have come together to work with the sector to strengthen safety, improve quality and better protect all children in early childhood.
Embedding a child-safe culture is a vital aspect of these reforms, ensuring that every child feels valued, respected, and protected within all ECEC settings.
Education Ministers met in October 2025 and reaffirmed their agreement that dedicated, committed early educators are our greatest asset in caring for, educating and keeping our children safe. They acknowledge that educators play a pivotal role in shaping the future of Australian children by providing them with high-quality education and care.
In September 2025, new regulatory amendments to the NQF were introduced including:
- new policy and procedures required for services around digital technologies
- notification timeframes for allegations or incidents of physical and sexual abuse reduced from 7 days to 24 hours
- the use of vaping devices and substances prohibited in service environments.
From 1 January 2026, refinements to the National Quality Standards (NQS) will commence to sharpen the focus on child safety and explicitly reference child safety within quality areas 2 and 7.
The next phase of changes, as set out in the Bill, will commence on 27 February 2026, with a small number of provisions to take effect earlier. Key reforms include:
- making the safety, rights and best interests of children the paramount consideration in the operation of an education and care service
- ensuring the safe use of digital devices
- mandating national child safety and child protection training
- establishing 'inappropriate conduct' as an offence
- enabling regulators to share the identity of prohibited individuals with their approved provider
- broadening the range of regulatory responses available for addressing misconduct
- removing the ability to apply for ongoing service waivers related to regulation 115—premises designed to facilitate supervision
- allowing effective identification, monitoring and regulation of 'related providers'
- making it an offence for anyone subject to a prohibition notice to give a recruitment agency false or misleading information about that notice
- expanding the powers of regulators to information-share with recruitment agencies
- establishment of a mandatory national early childhood educator register
- extending the limitation period for offences to enable prosecution to be undertaken, including a 'stop the clock' provision for prosecuting offences
- a three-fold increase to all maximum penalties under the National Quality Framework
- expanding the use of Penalty Infringement Notices
- strengthening requirements around working with children checks.
Additional measures for family day care (FDC) include:
- requiring assessments of FDC residences to include nearby areas accessible to children
- enabling authorised officers to access the FDC service premises and areas beyond residence for monitoring and compliance or investigation of offences or alleged offences.
The Bill and the Explanatory Memorandum are available on the
Victorian legislation website.
Into the future you will hear more about new powers to impose conditions on providers not meeting the National Quality Standards, the national CCTV assessment, development of the national early childhood worker register and implementation of the mandatory child safety training.
Please stay informed about these reforms as they are designed to support you and your service foster a child safe culture, embedding child safety in daily practices and interactions. Resources and guidance will be coming so keep a look out.
It is important that we work together to implement these important reforms. We thank you for the work you are doing to strengthen our safety measures so we can further protect children and ensure that every day, educators and staff are supported to continue to deliver high-quality, child safe education and care.
Upcoming child safety reform information sessions
With upcoming legislative changes due to take effect in early 2026, the department is committed to supporting early childhood education and care (ECEC) services in their preparations to strengthen safety and quality across Queensland.
A number of information sessions will be available for approved providers, services and educators to access the latest information and resources on new legislative amendments and additional safeguarding measures. Sessions will be recorded for those not able to attend on the available dates—register now.
More information