Dear fellow parents,

It has been a massive 6 weeks since ANU's devastating announcement to close our beloved centres. Since ANU said it would negotiate exclusively with the centres before going to open tender, our greatest concern with the negotiation process has been the continuity of care for all families and the pressure from ANU to radically change our core business model - operating principles that make our centres the incredible places they are today. 

ANU has been pressuring the centres to increase the number of children per educator, pay educators less and employ fewer educators with university qualifications, as a means to decrease salary and generate a surplus to pay commercial rent. These are pressures our centres are vulnerable to in order to have a fighting chance for survival. The Parents at UPCCC Statement - 23 July 2024 outlines our ongoing concerns following the statement made yesterday by ANU which confirms they are entering into exclusive negotiations with UPCCC and Heritage Early Childhood Centre (Heritage).

While our centres are continuing to engage with ANU in good faith through the negotiation process, it's essential we (as the parent community) maintain our lobbying momentum to save our centres.

Your ongoing support can help to keep the public pressure on ANU and scrutinise their processes to ensure the best outcome for our centres. Here are some ways you can help:

Continue to email other Members of Parliament 

The pressure we have generated is making a difference - but we need to ensure MPs understand that we continue to have major concerns over the integrity and transparency of ANU’s process, and that limited progress so far does not change this.

Here's a list of MPs you can use to direct your concerns. 

We have provided a template email to MPs that you can use which focuses on issues with the transparency and integrity of ANU’s process. You might find the information in the two UPCCC statements linked in this email useful to craft and personalise these emails.  

Raise the heritage issue with the Minister for the Environment and Water of Australia for investigation

Parents are concerned ANU is misusing the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 to evict the four existing community centres to give way for a commercial provider (or two) operating out of the two new “purpose-built” demountable style buildings. The Act is explicitly in its intention to protect sites of heritage value.

You are encouraged to write to Minister Tanya Plibersek to raise your concerns and encourage an investigation into ANU's compliance with the EPBC Act. The Parents at UPCCC Statement - 16 July 2024 outlines our concerns with the heritage advice and the broader integrity of the ANU’s process.

You can email your concerns to Minister.Plibersek@dcceew.gov.au

FOI requests
We encourage you to put in FOI (Freedom of Information) requests for official ANU files and correspondence that may be useful for scrutiny to ensure the process is fair, honest and transparent. Examples of FOI requests being explored include investigating whether ANU spoke to potential commercial childcare service providers ahead of informing UPCCC and others, internal/external comms upon ANU receiving the heritage report, scope of works for the remediation requirements, etc.

Details for FOI requests can be found at www.anu.edu.au/freedom-of-information/foi-requests

Here are some Helpful tips for submitting FOI requests.

Call for an audit of ANU's conflict of interest/procurement processes

Construction Controls’ dual role of leading the construction of the $8 million 'purpose-built' centres and procuring the heritage advice which resulted in terminating the childcare centres' operating licenses raise issues of potential conflict of interest. ANU's ongoing approach to withholding essential information and lack of genuine consultation with impacted stakeholders also raises concerns with their transparency.

To raise issues about ANU's integrity, conflict of interest, procurement and accountability responsibilities, you can:

• write to ANU's Audit and Rusk Management committee (details available at https://www.anu.edu.au/about/governance/committees/audit-risk-management-committee)
• write to the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) to invite an audit of the university's compliance (details available at www.anao.gov.au)

Share your concerns with the media

We encourage you to write letters to the editor to share your concerns and story with local news outlets. This may help to increase coverage to the issue and put further pressure on ANU to act in the best interest of the community. Key contacts to local news outlets are listed below:

Canberra Times: media.release@canberratimes.com.au
RiotACT: editor@region.com.au
Win News Canberra: cannews@winnsw.com.au
ABC Radio Canberra: abcradiocanberra@abc.net.au

Share your story about what you love about your community-led childcare

You can share your story about what your community-led childcare centre means to you on Facebook and tag @SaveANUcommunitychildcare. This will help to share our sentiment for community-led care across our networks to increase the profile of our advocacy to save our centres.

Thank you for continuing to support this journey. 

Regards

Parents at UPCCC