The federal government’s proposal to change the way childcare centres charge families – from daily to hourly rates – in the new family package has not been met with glee in Wagga.

Jessica Atherton has her 17-month-old son, Archer, in care and said she is concerned about the flexibility that would be available if these changes were implemented.

“At the moment there is lots of flexibility in the hours children attend because they pay for the whole day,” she said.

“I want to know if I will have a secure position for my child to attend.

“I would rather pay for the full day.”

Mrs Atherton has also worked in the industry for a number of years and said the change would be lengthy to implement as adjustments would need to be made to staff and student ratios.

“There’s a lot to consider,” she said.

“Any sort of change is hard.

“It would take time for the centres to adjust.”

Possums Playground Occasional Childcare centre manager, Romola Trevaskis, said parents would initially be enticed by what would seem like a price cut.

Ms Trevaskis said parents could end up paying more.

“Charging by the hour is going to move the hourly rate up,” she said.

“Half a day in a long day care can be as cheap as paying by the hour.

“I don’t think it would be good for anyone in the long run.”

Because of the centre’s classification, Possums is already required to charge parents by the hour.

Parents might only use the service for six hours a day but they would be required to be open for nine.

Ms Trevaskis said they had to implement incentives to parents in order to entice them to use the service for longer.

”We’ve seen a huge increase in the ability to cover cost by introducing incentives to utilise the centre longer,” she said.

“Parents don’t understand the maths behind it.

“It would be quite interesting to see what the government decides to do.”