The Hodgman Liberal Government has listened to the Tasmanian community about the value they place on the work of the Tasmanian Early Years Foundation.
We have worked closely with the Chair of the Foundation to support them to look at options that would enable the Foundation to continue its work using philanthropic grants and business support. This means that winding up the Foundation as a statutory entity will be postponed to enable that work to happen.
While winding up the Early Years Foundation had been identified as a budget savings measure it would be wrong to ignore the strong community desire to see the Foundation's work continue.
I have also invited the Chair of the Foundation to sit as a community member on the Department of Education's Early Years Reference Group, which will be an important avenue for providing advice to me about the early years, which we know is so crucial as a foundation for life.
While we work through establishing a new structure for the Early Years Foundation it will continue to fund the Empowering Parents, Empowering Communities (EPEC) for a further 12 months.
This will provide an opportunity to explore longer term funding and delivery arrangements for this valued program.
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