4402.0 - Childhood Education and Care, Australia, June 2014 Quality Declaration 
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 28/04/2015   
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WORK AND CHILD CARE

USE OF CHILD CARE BY EMPLOYED PARENTS

Of children in couple families in which both parents were employed, 60% (1.1 million) usually attended child care compared with 27% (310,700) in couple families where one parent was employed and 19% (31,700) in couple families where neither parent was employed. In one parent families where the parent was employed, 72% of children (237,200) usually attended child care, compared with 43% (148,900) of those whose parent was not employed. (Table 3)

In families where the youngest child usually attended child care, the proportion of employed female parents generally increased with the age of the youngest child, rising from 69% when the youngest child was aged 2 or 3 years to 86% when the youngest child was aged 9 to 12 years. In comparison, the proportion of employed male parents remained above 90% regardless of the age of the youngest child usually attending care. Similarly in families where the youngest child did not usually attend child care, the proportion of employed male parents generally remained around 88% regardless of the age of the youngest child while the proportion of employed female parents increased significantly when the youngest child was aged 4 or 5 years. (Table 4)

In families with at least one employed parent, the most commonly used work arrangement used by employed male and female parents to allow them to care for their children was flexible working hours (30% for employed male parent, 39% for employed female parent). Employed female parents were significantly more likely to work part-time (38%) compared with employed male parents (5%) while working from home was used by 19% of employed female parents and 14% of employed male parents. Among working female parents, similar proportions in couple families and one parent families used flexible working hours (39%) and part-time work (39% of couple families, 36% of one parent families) to care for their children. (Table 5)