66.6%* of Exceeding rated services regarded High or Very High Risk by NSW Regulatory Authority

August 27th, 2025 Latest News

During NSW Budget Estimates at NSW Parliament House today, both the NSW Parliamentary Committee and the acting NSW Minister for Education and Early Learning deliberated the use of "secret" ratings by the NSW Regulatory Authority.

In the NSW Regulatory Authority's defence, these "secret" ratings would be outcomes of their internal risk-based approach.

That said, the sample of 34 NSW-based services examined by the Independent Review of the NSW Regulatory Authority showed that 66.6% of services rated as Exceeding the National Quality Standards were also regarded by the NSW Regulatory Authority as High Risk or Very High Risk (see page 73 of the Wheeler Report).

It therefore begs the question, why were those services rated Exceeding then? And how were those services' Quality Area 2 - Children's Health and Safety rated as Meeting the National Quality Standards or better?

For many many years, ACA NSW has persistently and overtly questioned the quality ratings process (particularly after the five successive years of national records of breaches/non-compliances in NSW being greater than the rest of Australia combined).

Moreover, if the NSW Regulatory Authority regarded services as High Risk or Very High Risk, then does the NSW Regulatory Authority (consistently) use any/all of the existing nine (9) laws:

National Law: Section 23(1) – The Regulatory Authority can amend provider approval at any time.
National Law: Section 25(b) – The Regulatory Authority can suspend a service for failure to comply with a condition of the provider approval at any time.
National Law: Section 55(1) – The Regulatory Authority can amend a service approval at any time.
National Law: Section 70(b) and 70(f) – The Regulatory Authority can suspend service approval if the service breaches any condition(s) or failed to comply with a direction, compliance notice or emergency order in anywhere across Australia.
National Law: Section 73 – The Regulatory Authority can suspend service approval without show cause.
National Law: Section 77(a) – The Regulatory Authority can cancel service approval if the service constitutes an unacceptable risk to the safety, health or wellbeing of any child or class of children.
National Law: Section 80(1) – The Regulatory Authority can cancel service approval to the extent that it relates to associated children’s service
National Law: Section 75 – The Regulatory Authority can suspend service approval to the extent that it relates to associated children’s service.
National Law: Section 70(d) – The Regulatory Authority can suspend service approval for not meeting the National Quality Standards and there have not been any improvements.