A new month and there is good news for working parents. Priority rules in subsidised Flemish childcare change. The changes benefit parents in education or working at least 80% of a full-time roster.
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New childcare priority rules benefiting working parents kick in on 1 April
Colin Clapson
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New priority rules come into force in subsidised childcare in Flanders from 1 April onwards. Childcare providers will now only be able to reserve a maximum of 10 per cent of their places for children from vulnerable families. Until now, a 20 per cent rule was in force. In this way, the Flemish government wants to give priority to parents working at least 80% of a full-time roster or in education.
"As a basic rule, as a childcare provider, you give priority to families for whom childcare is necessary in order to allow the parents to work or to follow training with a view to work," the Children’s Agency explains.
Many organisations inside and outside the childcare sector are critical of the new rules. They fear it will further reinforce inequality and exclude parents in poverty. On 20 March a score of organisations announced they were filing a complaint against the new priority rules with Belgium’s constitutional court to lodge.