Integrated practice in the early years in Australia: The assumptions,omissions and contradictions of policy reform

Abstract

The aim of this article is to examine current national early years’ policy reform, which emphasises the importance of service integration, national quality standards and a quality knowledge base for educators concerning the provision of early childhood education and care. Using Queensland, Australia, as an example, a policy discourse analysis identifies two problematics of implementing current national policy – the early childhood education and care problematic and the integration problematic. The article argues that speedy implementation of a national policy in order to meet national targets has unintended consequences for the knowledge base of educators and the possibility of collaboration within service provision. Although government commitment in this area is evident, these consequences and the current difficulties surrounding integration are the result of the lack of a specific integration strategy, and government investment focussed on the development of an integrated workforce.

Keywords

assumptions contradictions early childhood education and care integration transdisciplinary

Introduction

The field of early childhood education and care (ECEC) in Australia has always been a complex one. This complexity is compounded by the fact that each state and territory has its own regulations and approaches to how the field is governed and also to how certain practices are enacted. This situation has caused fragmentation that has often led to division between those who work in the sector. Such fragmentation has been longstanding and has led to many significant and somewhat inequitable changes to policy and practice. Thus, it is difficult when engaging educators from ECEC in any discussion or debate about particular issues and problems, as their responses and experiences in relation to such issues and problems are often varied (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2012).

This situation has become more problematic in recent times, as the Australian government has implemented policy that privileges integrated practice in the early years (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009). This type of practice calls for professionals of different disciplines to work together, often in one setting, to deliver programmes of care, education and early intervention and prevention to young children and their families. This practice may be considered enriching in many respects, for example, diverse opinions might lead to more complete information about children and families. However, in a sector so fragmented as the ECEC sector in Australia, such practice can also be highly problematic.

This notion of inter-professional practice and integration of services came to prominence in 2003 when the UK government introduced a Green Paper entitled Every Child Matters (Crown Copyright, 2003). This legislation was introduced following a public outcry resulting from the death of Victoria Climbie, a young girl tortured and abused by her great aunt and the man with whom they lived. Via this Green Paper and the subsequent Children Act 2004, the UK government sought to improve services for children and families by focussing on early intervention and prevention programmes, which included universal and targeted integrated frontline delivery. For the UK government, this integrated delivery would include certain elements such as, a common assessment framework that incorporated a shared language about children and young people and information sharing across services. The main aim was to ensure that health services worked more effectively with other children’s services and schools.

This approach to integrated practice was underpinned by a very solid framework with outcomes for children and families at the centre. The notion of integrated frontline delivery was supported by a whole-of-system change that included integrated processes, integrated strategy and inter-agency governance. The delivery of these integrated frontline services was centred in the Sure Start Children’s Centres, managed by local authorities with a view to allowing the centres to partner with statutory and voluntary organisations. Children’s centres were to be ‘models of integrated service provision where primary care trusts, LAs, JobCentre Plus, education and child care providers, social services and community and voluntary agencies work together to deliver seamless and holistic services’ (Crown Copyright, 2003).

These Children’s Centres were to work as integrated hubs for the local community by ‘bringing together a range of services, usually under one roof, whose practitioners then work in a multi-agency way to deliver integrated support to children and families’ (Children’s Workforce Development Council, 2010: np). The services were to have a common location, in this case the children’s centre, share a common philosophy, vision and agreed principles for working with children and families. In fact, these notions, a common philosophy, vision and agreed principles for working with children and families, are at the heart of the definition of integrated practice utilised in the Sure Start programme and informed the agreed framework of practice across disciplines. Since this article has been written, the Sure Start Model has been broken apart. However, it was this framework that gave integrated practice its best opportunity for success and indeed there is evidence that success did occur.

While this idea of integrated ECEC practice in Australia has been adopted from the UK approach, a different approach to its implementation has been utilised. The Australian approach has not been underpinned by a strong practice framework and does not have a uniform point of delivery. This different approach has led to unintended consequences, which have impacted on the way integrated practice has been understood and rolled out in Australia. While the policy relating to integrated practice seeks to affirm these initiatives, practice ‘in the real’ (Foucault, 1981: 13) does not reach these standards. Practice does not represent integrated service delivery with a focus on inter-professional work where professionals interact around particular cases rather than working in isolation. Additionally, practice is not underpinned by a shared vision, philosophy and agreed principles.

Aims and scope

This article examines the introduction of the recent government policy on integrated ECEC practice and also its current impact on the ECEC sector in Australia. The authors undertake a policy discourse analysis as a means of challenging particular philosophical approaches to ECEC practice and the policy moves to integrated practice. Thus, the authors seek to create a space of interrogation (Elwick, 2010), which provides possibilities for looking beyond reductive concepts and habitual ways of thinking (Elwick, 2010) in order to consider how practice might be otherwise (Foucault, 1984).

Borrowing from Popkewitz and Lindblad (2000) and Macfarlane (2010), the article takes the form of a discursive policy analysis and cross-disciplinary literature review. Such an approach enables the examination of the assumptions, omissions and contradictions (Bowe et al., 1992) in current ECEC policy direction, which will highlight consequences for the ECEC sector. This approach will also demonstrate how integrated ECEC practice in Australia is neither possible nor impossible at this particular historical time and the impact this uncertainty has on the contemporary ECEC knowledge base.

Situating this investigation as problematic allows for the application of critical social theory as a framework for analysis. In particular, the authors use ideas from Michel Foucault (1980, 1984) who viewed the notion of truth as contingent and problematic. Foucault’s (1980, 1984) ideas and prominent applications of these ideas are used to situate truth as a product of discourse where systems of language use and systems of power relations work to produce particular understandings as either thinkable or unthinkable. In this case, truths produced by discourses of ECEC and integrated practice in the early years are highlighted and scrutinised. Foucault’s work differs from Critical Ideological theory where power is considered a repressive force imposed largely by the state. In Foucault’s work power is both productive and repressive and thus, invitations by governments to engage can be considered genuinely intended but not always possible in practice. Thus, while the idea of integrated ECEC practice might be genuine and possible, its implementation might be rendered impossible by constraints in practice such as siloed approaches and other powerful discourses (Foucault, 1980).

Foucault’s (1980, 1984) understandings enable policy examination and implementation to be opened up for scrutiny in ways that allow contradictions to be brought into focus. This means that new understandings of consequences for children, families and professionals can be highlighted. Moreover, Popkewitz and Linbland’s (2000) idea of examining the problematic is also useful as it eliminates the focus on what is right or wrong while enabling a focus on taken-for-granted assumptions. Moreover, this approach enables a focus on the history of policy from past to present which assists in the development of an understanding of how present policy has come to be produced.

In Australia, some instances of integrated practice are occurring in Early Years Centres across the country. The Queensland government’s Early Years Centres, which are run by a variety of non-government organisations (NGOs), are engaging in integrated practice – that is, for the purposes of this article – in inter-professional practice and integrated service delivery. These centres are providing early intervention and prevention, health and well being programmes for families in particular place-based settings across the state. Alongside these early intervention and prevention programmes, child care programmes are being run. Practice in these centres is integrated as the centres deliver universal and targeted soft entry programmes, which are accessible to any family in the region. Soft entry programmes involve the implementation of non-stigmatised approaches to service delivery where practice is strengths-based rather than deficit focussed. Via the delivery of these programmes, families can explore options for or be referred to other health and community–based services contained within the Early Years Centres or in other NGOs. However, although these centres, which are closer to those in the Sure Start model, are running successfully, they are yet to bridge a variety of issues. Such issues include: disparity between federal and state government laws, the erosion of the early years’ knowledge base, the inadequate preparation of early years’ teachers, the care and education dichotomy, inequitable pay conditions, an inherited silo mentality and confusion related to different definitions and terms. These issues will be discussed in the sections relating to the ECEC philosophy problematic and the integration problematic.

ECEC practice in Australia

In ECEC in Australia, practice is implemented largely across the health, education and community services sectors. Within these sectors, silos of practice exist (Press and Woodrow, 2005), which restrict the opportunities for knowledge exchange, create duplication of services and contribute to increased costs (Macfarlane, 2010). Moreover, lack of knowledge exchange means that new ideas and approaches in particular sectors are often not understood in others, thereby increasing protectiveness of individual knowledge bases and fostering suspicion that decisions about particular practice approaches are not evidence-based (Cheeseman, 2007). Such factors undermine, rather than enhance possibilities for knowledge sharing and exchange, break down possibilities for successful integration of services and also result in less inclusive practices in work with young children and their families (Macfarlane, 2010; Moore and McDonald, 2013).

It is amidst this fragmentation that federal government legislation about integrated ECEC practice has been introduced. The Rudd Labor Government’s National Early Years Reform Agenda had a key focus for all Australian children to ‘have access to high quality early learning and care’ (Rudd and Maklin, 2007), which has placed ECEC at the forefront of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) agenda since 2007. A National Early Years Learning Framework was developed as a response to COAG concerns to address the issue of quality ECEC across Australia. This framework is to be used by all educators and professionals working with young children aged from birth to 5 years, regardless of the context, to build greater continuity in the approach to early years’ learning and development. This policy assumes (Bowe et al., 1992) that there is a consolidated and agreed knowledge base across sectors. If this agreement is missing then ideas of inter-professional practice and integrated service delivery cannot be assumed.

Such is the case in other policy documents. Specifically, past documents, such as the Starting Strong II report (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), 2006), the Stronger Families and Communities Strategy (Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, 2004), the Best Start report (Raban et al., 2006) and the Towards an Early Years Strategy (Department of Communities, Disability Services and Seniors, Queensland, 2006), have all pointed to the need for early years’ professionals to be prepared to work in integrated settings. Additionally, more recently such practice has been endorsed nationally in Investing in the Early Years – A National Early Childhood Development Strategy (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009) and Supporting the Development of Young Children in Australia: 2009: A Snapshot (Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR), 2009a). These initiatives and reports seek to inform universities and other tertiary institutions that present ECEC preparation programmes do not extend to preparing prospective educators and professionals to work in such integrated settings (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009; Department of Communities, Disability Services and Seniors, Queensland, 2006; Elliott, 2006; OECD, 2006). In fact, there is, at present, little real focus on how to prepare educators and professionals for these integrated practice settings in higher education programmes, particularly at the undergraduate level or indeed, in terms of the pathways into such programmes (Sims, 2010).

Moreover, it is important to note that the Investing in the Early Years Document introduced in 2009 is the last official federal government policy document relating to how work in ECEC is to proceed. This document was meant to influence practice in this area until 2020. At this stage, the recent change of government in Australia has not indicated any alterations to this policy, which originally had bipartisan support via COAG (2009a). It therefore appears that Australia is moving forward for now with this current policy. This is confirmed by the current federal government’s commitment to the National Early Childhood Reform Agenda, which still refers to integrated ECEC services.

The government focus on the introduction of early years’ integrated practice and on high quality early learning and care is further complicated by the fact that each state in Australia has its own legislation surrounding ECEC programmes. Moreover, the fact that complex legislation is now being implemented in an already contentious space, means that many consequences both intended and unintended are already present. The second assumption of these policies (Bowe et al., 1992) then is that it is possible for federal policy to be seamlessly implemented in an environment where multiple legislative requirements are present. Such an assumption merely exacerbates the complexity of the implementation of this policy reform.

To navigate and account for the complexity of this policy and the environment where the policy is being implemented, this article examines the implementation of government policy on early years’ integrated practice according to two problematics – the ECEC philosophy problematic and the integration problematic. These two problematics are used to highlight how such a policy environment leads to the previously mentioned intended and unintended consequences for all stakeholders in the ECEC sector. These problematics are used to consider Foucault’s (1980, 1984) work which would situate these notions as neither right nor wrong but would hold them up for scrutiny so that taken-for-granted truths are made visible.

The ECEC philosophy problematic – the care and education dichotomy

One of the ways in which ECEC policy reforms can be examined is by considering this sector in an individual state in Australia. To do so, the authors of this article have chosen the state of Queensland. The reason for this choice lies in the fact that arguably, it is in Queensland where the most stark differences and constraints are being experienced. By considering the impact of these differences and constraints in this state, a picture of the assumptions, omissions and contradictions (Bowe et al., 1992) of early years’ policy implementation in Australia can be examined.

In recent years the ECEC field in Queensland, Australia, has negotiated significant change. In fact, it is in Queensland where some of the divisions between educators in ECEC have been most strongly highlighted. As early as 1988, Petrie explored the notion of the care and education dichotomy that was dividing the ECEC sector, arguing for a more streamlined approach to practice (Petrie, 1988). In the years since this paper, this dichotomy still exists in Queensland, (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004). Alison Elliott (2006) attests to this point stating that recent funding shifts have widened the care/education dichotomy (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004). Elliott (2006) states, ‘The funding shift from “education” to “care” without also providing strong developmental and learning programmes in child care centres has widened the care–education divide and disadvantaged countless children’ (p. 11).

While most ECEC educators would undoubtedly welcome the recent state and federal government attention to the importance of the early years in policy formulation, governments are still designing policy in line with the care and education dichotomy (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2012). For example, in Queensland in 2008, announcements by the then Premier of Queensland, the Honourable Anna Bligh, only added to this dichotomy. The new policy direction at that time separated care and education for 0- to 5-year-olds by establishing more educational sites for 3- to 4-year-olds in the form of 240 extra kindergartens (limited hours settings – 2 years before school) across the state. In the Toward Queensland 2 policy release (Department of Education and Training (DET), 2008), the Premier announced that younger children would now have access to better early years’ services by the Queensland government and the Federal government supporting child care centres to provide ‘better’ early childhood education, for 3- to 4-year-old children (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2012).

This government investment highlighted the difference between those children who are ‘entitled to education’ and those who are ‘entitled to care’. For example, in 2008, the government’s own figures stated that of the 53,000, 3- to 4-year-old children in Queensland, only 12,000 attend an early childhood centre where a qualified teacher delivers ‘a recognised education program’ (DET, 2008: np). Only 10 per cent of the 29,000 who attend child care centres were able to have access to ‘an education program delivered by a qualified teacher’ (DET, 2008: np). To address this issue, the Queensland government was to spend 300 million AUD building new ‘extended’ kindergartens for 3- to 4-year-olds and make further funds available to provide ‘support’ to the child care centres currently ‘offering a valuable service’ for working families. Thus, in the Premier’s terms, child care centres provide a ‘service’, while kindergartens provide ‘better’ early childhood education (DET, 2008: np). Such thinking represents the third assumption of both Queensland and Federal government policy (Bowe et al., 1992) – that care and education are different and not therefore inextricably linked. This thinking also means a contradiction in policy (Bowe et al., 1992) as care and education are treated as silos rather than understanding these disciplines as integral to each other.

Disparity between federal and state government laws

Such notions are challenging for the ECEC sector on two fronts. First, the different legislation in each state means that states like Queensland are lagging behind. Although the figures relating to access for 3- to 4-year-olds to an Early Childhood Education teacher have improved since 2008 having risen to 77 per cent by 2012, they are still low compared to other states (Department of Education, Training and Employment, 2014). In fact, figures in government documents actually conflict with the Report on Government Services 2013 still indicating that the proportion of children enrolled in full-time pre-school in 2011/2012 is at around 40 per cent. This means that the Queensland government still has a significant task in front of it if federal government targets of access to quality childhood education for 15 hours a week for 40 weeks a year, 1 year prior to school for all children are to be reached by the end of 2014 (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009; DEEWR, 2009b). Consequently, the Queensland government is doing all it can to encourage teachers into early childhood education to meet this demand. For example, this government has a plan in place, entitled the Early Childhood Education and Care Workforce Action plan 2011–2014, which represents an investment of over $76 million in the ECEC workforce in order to meet the new federal government targets (Department of Employment, Education and Training, 2011).

The second problem is that some of the strategies the Queensland government is implementing were questionable from the perspective of contemporary early years’ practice. One such example exists in a 36-week Technical and Further Education (TAFE) bridging course being offered to teachers so that they can ‘add’ early childhood to their repertoire (see http://www.qct.edu.au/PDF/PSU/Fact%20Sheet-BridgingProgramV2.pdf). Completion of the stated programme would allow individuals registered as a teacher with the Queensland College of Teachers prior to December 2011 to hold employment as a kindergarten teacher in care centres. The inference of such a programme is that early years’ teachers do not need many additional skills that require longer periods of study. The suggestion that a 36-week course, with no emphasis on service integration, is enough to re-train primary and secondary teachers indicates that early childhood expertise can be obtained by a short, sharp add-on. This is the second contradiction of government policy (Bowe et al., 1992) considering the value the federal government is placing on all 3- to 4-year-old children having access to ‘quality play-based early childhood education’ by a university educated early years’ professional (DEEWR, 2009b). While most early childhood teachers train for 4 years in order to specialise in this discipline, it is now maintained (via this bridging programme) that a 6-month add-on to any other teaching programme is sufficient to produce a university qualified ECEC teacher.

The inadequate preparation of the early years’ teacher – inequitable pay conditions

This notion is highly concerning for the early years’ sector as it diminishes the value of the expertise of the early childhood teacher. This situation that exists in Queensland has been historically constituted and embedded in policy as a result of many somewhat unrelated but important historical events. One such event occurred in 1996, when the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission (QIRC) handed down a landmark decision that was to have a significant impact on the child care field in Queensland (Burton and Lyons, 2000; Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004). This decision included a claim that early childhood teachers working in day care should receive pay parity with teachers in other sectors. During these hearings this claim eventually focussed on one issue; whether teachers employed in day care centres were actually teaching (Burton and Lyons, 2000; Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004). The decision was that teachers in day care were not teaching – they were merely providing a developmental programme. Such a move meant that as a developmental programme required ‘less’ skill, these teachers did not ‘deserve’ pay parity (Burton and Lyons, 2000). The Industrial Court endorsed a discursive shift that instituted a demarcation between education and development (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004). Education was clearly more worthwhile and those who provided education were worth more fiscally (Macfarlane and Lewis, 2004).

During the court case, private long day care providers argued against the pay claim (Burton and Lyons, 2000). These arguments centred on the fact that when a qualified teacher was not required to provide an educational programme, then they were not entitled to pay parity for such a programme. Significantly, one employers’ organisation argued,

If Teachers [sic] are to have a significant place in childcare it needs to be on the basis that they are doing something conceptually and identifiably different to other childcare workers. If this is not the case and the view is maintained that they do the same thing as other workers only a whole lot better, then the simple reality is that the childcare industry does not, in most cases, want or need what they have to offer. (Local Government Association final submission, QIRC, 1996: 11, cited in Burton and Lyons, 2000)

This particular industrial position, that is still part of law in Queensland, endorsed the divide between care and education, making it very difficult for care to be considered as significant as education. This industrial position has impacted on all involved in ECEC in this state, as other policy and industrial decisions that have followed it have continued to endorse the notion that education matters more than care. This endorsement has also led to the idea that education is conducted in more formalised environments and that informal environments represent care and so cannot include education. This issue represents both a further assumption and contradiction (Bowe et al., 1992) of the Early Years Reform Agenda and its focus on integrated practice. This Agenda assumes that the policy in relation to making teachers available to 3- to 4-year-olds will transfer easily to all states. However, this legislation in Queensland means that teachers delivering this programme in this state will not receive pay parity or as it happens, the same recreation leave as teachers in other sectors as the Queensland situation does not make room for this possibility. This begs the question – how will such teachers be retained in the sector? Furthermore, another contradiction in policy is evident. If care and education are different as they clearly are in this Queensland policy, then the practice undertaken in these sectors cannot as easily be integrated as it could be if they were considered to be inextricably linked. At this point then, the aspect of the federal government’s Early Years Reform Agenda relating to universal access to an early childhood teacher for 3- to 4-year-olds has not meant a change to this Queensland decision. This means that a high level of uncertainty remains a consequence within the sector in this state and possibilities for teacher retention in child care are minimised.

The erosion of the early years’ knowledge base

The contemporary early years’ knowledge base is underpinned by multiple theoretical approaches such as those of Vygotsky, Rogoff and Malaguzzi, which view children holistically, as capable and independent learners who learn best when they are actively involved in negotiating their own learning, and exploring their own interests (Arthur et al., 2012; Grieshaber and Canella, 2001; Hutchins and Sims, 1999). This view of young children is not widely endorsed by other sectors, including the larger education sector, where approaches to learning are often more compartmentalised and structured. The policy decisions being made in Queensland, in an effort to meet federal government targets (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009; DEEWR, 2009b) are being made quickly as necessitated by these aforementioned targets. This speedy implementation is undermining the possibility of privileging holistic strength-based views of children and childhood, which the ECEC sector provides and holds as integral to their practice.

A federal policy such as the Early Years Reform Agenda becomes problematic as differences between states in training, definitions of and settings of practice for kindergarten teachers are obvious. While it could be argued that such a situation may only impact on Queenslanders, other states are not immune from such anomalies. In Queensland kindergarten, teachers work in kindergartens, schools and child care centres, and are 4 year trained by education faculties. While in Victoria, for example, kindergarten teachers are 3 or 4 year trained by education faculties and work in kindergartens and child care centres but not necessarily in schools, depending on where they are trained. Uniformity of practice is significantly difficult when terms have different meanings in different locations. For a sector already complicated by a care/education dichotomy, the differences exacerbated by policies like the Early Years Reform Agenda contribute to the many assumptions and contradictions already highlighted, which work to break down unity and fragment and not integrate practice in the sector.

In Moss’ (2006) terms a move to situate early childhood teachers firmly within the child care arena disrupts current child care discourses. This move is disruptive as it attempts to align the pedagogic and child care discourses (Moss, 2006), trying to close the ‘widening care–education divide’ (Elliott, 2006: 14). To attempt such a move on this ECEC field at the moment is both enabling and constraining (Foucault, 1980). Moss (2006) states that similar competition between early childhood education pedagogic discourses and child care discourses are complicating the sector in the United Kingdom. Such a position is replicated and intensified in Australia, where reforms do not have a solid infrastructure as they did in the United Kingdom, are moving quickly and where the care/education dichotomy is growing and not shrinking (Elliott, 2006), in relation to such reforms. What is most apparent is that unless the complexities that some of these policy initiatives create are fully understood and accommodated then it is likely that new and exciting opportunities will only be achieved for a few.

The integration problematic

The notion of integrated practice in ECEC, which is currently being promoted in Australia, is being used to encourage government and NGOs to work together in order that parents and children are provided with seamless service delivery and practice. Integrated practice is intended to be transdisciplinary, where professionals focus on inquiry rather than disciplines. Transdisciplinarity goes beyond multi-disciplinarity and inter-disciplinarity as it seeks to deal with the supercomplexity of family situations by placing the family and its issues and not the discipline at the centre of practice. In Australia, integrated practice is not necessarily being promoted as transdisciplinary and so no infrastructure to support this notion is being established. Thus, integrated practice in Australia is still being implemented in a siloed way, with the focus on particular disciplines rather than on particular practices.

It is likely that the implementation of integrated practice in Australia allows for an acknowledgement of the health and community services focus of this type of practice but that the ECEC focus can be somewhat overlooked. ECEC practice in integrated settings can be viewed through a health or community services lens. This means that the contemporary ECEC knowledge base – one that is strengths-based, holistic, child centred and driven and underpinned by childhood competence – can be marginalised, or overlooked in favour of health and developmentalist approaches or not considered at all. Such an omission (Bowe et al., 1992) has significant consequences for ECEC professionals and for children and families as space for more prescriptive, formal and deficit-based approaches is made available and so this omission needs to be addressed in policy reform.

Addressing this omission is difficult while there is a sense that care and education are somewhat divided. This is problematic for early childhood care and education professionals who actually sit ‘in between’ these two sectors to some extent. It is possible that confusion will occur as a result and ECEC professionals may not be able to find a place that situates them as leading these integrated settings.

Integration in Australia

In 2004, the Australian Government introduced the Stronger Families and Communities Initiative. Underpinned by the work undertaken in the United Kingdom around the establishment of Sure Start, which endorsed the notion of integrated practice, this initiative was designed to give children, families and communities the opportunity ‘to build a better future’ (Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, 2004). John Howard’s Liberal government, via the Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, funded particular NGOs to lead community development and capacity building in certain designated communities (Macfarlane, 2010). The Stronger Families and Communities Strategy sought to encourage a collaborative approach to community development, understanding that solutions to community issues are manifested through the efforts, resources and assets located within various settings including community services, health, education and child care centres. Thus, the initiative sought to align these community development strategies with the knowledge base of ECEC (Macfarlane, 2010).

The Stronger Families and Communities Strategy was introduced as a result of Australian and international evidence that confirmed that the early years of a child’s life were critical to future development, particularly as it is the period of rapid brain growth and development (Mustard, 2001). Moreover, it was highlighted that it is during this period of life when the ‘foundations for learning, behaviour and health over the life course are set’ (Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, 2004: np). The centre-piece of this Stronger Families and Communities Strategy was the Communities for Children (CfC) project. The government positioned this programme as a ‘new and innovative approach to policy development and service delivery’ (Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, 2004: np). It was via this programme that the government intended to implement local strategies that ‘[were] grounded in evidence about what works best to support early childhood development’ (Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs, 2004: np).

The Stronger Families and Communities Initiative was originally funded with $142 million, part of which was used to fund the CfC project. Under the CfC project, NGOs were funded as Facilitating Partners (FPs) in specific regions to oversee the development of a Community Strategic Plan (CSP) and a Service Delivery Plan (SDP) for the region. Each FP organised, in consultation with the local community, their own CSP and SDP for the region, to be approved by the Department of Families, Communities and Indigenous Affairs. FPs were selected by tender and, while the brief of the Australian Government was to deliver services that aligned community development strategies with the knowledge base of ECEC, there was no clear definition about how this alignment was to occur. Moreover, there was no requirement that the FP employ managers or workers who were able to understand and articulate both the community development and early years’ knowledge bases. Such a situation represents an omission in policy (Bowe et al., 1992), as there has been no effort to ensure an agreed upon approach to early years’ care and education and no official instruction or in service about how to engage in inter-professional practice and integrated service delivery.

The CfC projects were funded from 2006 to 2009. Following the election of the Rudd Labor government in 2007, the Stronger Families and Communities Initiative was re-invented becoming the Family Support programme and the CfC projects were re-funded in some cases and extended. In the Rudd programme, the focus shifted more strongly towards targeted rather than universal services. While the term ‘integrated’ was not specifically used, one of the main aims of the programme was more flexible and responsive services that families can ‘more easily enter and move between … reducing the silos that were evident in the previous structure’. Thus, the notion of ‘intensive and co-ordinated support’ was still very much a focus of practice and was further endorsed by the Gillard government. It is yet to be seen how the Abbott federal government responds to this policy but initial indications are that the CfC programmes have now received a further five years of funding under the Abbott Coalition government so the commitment to integrated practice is still strong.

Inherited silo mentality

In the UK approach, the notion of integration was situated, legislated and resourced with infrastructure according to a specific framework of integrated practice while, in Australia, the Family Support programme and the new Abbott Government legislation has no underlying inter-professional philosophy or infrastructure that supports the implementation of such an approach. Second, the Australian approach also separates education and care and is not situated in child care.

Additionally, the Australian approach relies on implementation via NGOs. The participation of government organisations is somewhat ad hoc and determined by understandings of the term ‘integrated’ and how this notion links to multi-disciplinary and non-siloed practice. This means that government and non-government organisations have no shared philosophy, vision, language or intent in relation to how integrated practice might be implemented. Inter-professional practice occurs largely through the good will of those involved and the willingness of individuals to seek out ways of engaging via a shared vision and language, which is informed by all partners. Consequently, there is no real incentive for professionals, who consider their knowledge base powerful and evidence-based, to break out of silos to consider other perspectives. This situation has particular implications for early years’ teachers and educators, particularly those with lower levels of training. The question of ‘who leads’ in integrated and inter-professional contexts is contested and ‘up for grabs’. While the ECEC sector is discussing ‘what’ needs to be included in pre-service early childhood education programmes (Sims, 2010), leadership roles in integrated settings are being decided in a siloed way, which may privilege more traditional roles and knowledge bases such as those in medicine and health.

Confusion relating to different definitions and terms

However, the Commonwealth of Australia (2009) policy document Investing in the Early Years – A National Early Childhood Development Strategy has a much more specific approach to the notion of integrated practice. Based on an ecological model (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009: 15), the document suggests ‘integrated early childhood development services and [a] support delivery model’ (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009: 19). However, the definition of an integrated model in this document appears to be related to the delivery of services and not the way that practice is implemented. In this document ‘an integrated model’ is defined as a combination of intensive, targeted and universal services (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009: 19). The document highlights the importance of building partnerships with NGOs and employers and also signifies the importance of ‘establishing clear and accessible referral pathways between universal to targeted and intensive services … building the evidence base about integrated service delivery models’ (Commonwealth of Australia, 2009: 27). It does not, at any time, promote the notion of ‘integrated practice’ as involving a more inter-disciplinary (where a group of allied professionals work together to support children and families from their own disciplinary perspective) or transdisciplinary (where a group of allied professionals work together by moving beyond their discipline to a new space of practice that provides more seamless programme delivery) approach, which is in contrast to policy in the United Kingdom. While the notion of a more cohesive approach is implied in the Australian document, there is not the strong focus on multi-agency practice or governance as such and there is certainly no funding to support necessary infrastructure relating to such practice. The omission in this policy (Bowe et al., 1992) is the lack of some further information of how to engage in inter-professional practice and integrated service delivery. It is assumed (Bowe et al., 1992) that professionals know how to collaborate and that integrated service delivery will occur simply by co-locating services (Moore and McDonald, 2013) or by centring programme delivery in one service, which has the responsibility to broker to other organisations. It is also assumed that funds for in-servicing and extra resources will not be required.

Such discussion is not meant to suggest that there is not funding to change the way in which early years’ services are delivered. The omission in the policy (Bowe et al., 1992) is not lack of funding but the fact that there is no specific government brief on how these services are to be led or how the staff are to practice underpinning these services. It would appear that these notions are largely at the discretion of the sponsoring agency and the staff that they employ. A breaking down of silos happens serendipitously or by accident (Foucault, 1980) as it relies purely on the way in which particular individuals and organisations interpret how integrated practice will happen ‘in the real’ (Foucault, 1981: 13).

There is a plethora of research (Moore, 2008) relating to how this notion of integrated practice actually works, with suggestions that such practice does not merely ‘happen’ by osmosis, co-location or even policy direction. Moore and Skinner (2010) state that effective integration requires four levels of practice. These include policy integration across governments, local integration of planning, service delivery integration and integration of teams and professional roles. Therefore, what is evident with respect to the Australian approach is that policy relating to integration of services and inter-professional practice contains many assumptions, omissions and contradictions (Bowe et al., 1992), which create confusion about how policy is enacted ‘in the real’ (Foucault, 1981: 13). Thus, while such elements as information sharing and common assessment frameworks (Sims, 2010) might lead to improvements in early years’ practice, these elements do not ensure integrated practice, nor do they clearly indicate whose practice and knowledge base is privileged to lead implementation in such settings.

Viewed in this way, the intention of policy can be open to interpretation, and the objectives misrecognised (Macfarlane, 2006) or misunderstood. The authors of this article suggest that this is the case with current early years’ policy in Australia. The suggestion is that these notions of integration and inter-professional practice are not clear, understood nor agreed upon at this point in time. Furthermore, it can be argued that such terms are being misrepresented, misused and misinterpreted. Confusion continues in relation to the term ‘integrated’ and this situation is unlikely to change. Moreover, terms like ‘inter-professional’, ‘multi-disciplinary’, ‘inter-disciplinary’ and ‘transdisciplinary’ are being used sometimes, interchangeably, to describe the notion of integrated practice. However, these terms all mean something different with respect to practice. Nevertheless, it is in the definition of these terms and their application that the possibility for an enhanced level of practice might be found.

Conclusion

The examination of these integration and ECEC philosophy problematics has highlighted how the notion of integration, although mandated in Australian government policy is both possible and impossible in practice. The analysis points to a lack of an integration strategy, which would work to outline the steps necessary for collaboration and integration, and facilitate its achievement. While the federal Australian government intention in this policy may indeed be genuine, the financial commitment is misdirected. The Australian government has not invested in preparing its workforce for the introduction of this policy, the infrastructure required for the policy to be enacted or the education required in the move from siloed to integrated practice. The Australian government has both followed and not followed the UK government. While the intention of the Sure Start programme in the United Kingdom was taken on board in Australia, the real implications of implementing such policy in an environment where such complex state law exists have not been considered. Thus, the assumptions, omissions and contradictions of policy implementation are more apparent. In short, early years’ policy reform in relation to integrated practice in Australia is moving in an ad hoc way.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

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