Family spokeswoman LAbg Kerstin Suchan-Mayr and Lower Austria GVV President Rupert Dworak also brought a reduction in group sizes into play. Decisions should be made in one of the upcoming state parliament sessions, it said.
The broadcast referred to talks between the ÖVP, SPÖ and FPÖ on Monday. “Slowly but surely, things are moving: The entry age for Lower Austrian state kindergartens is now to be reduced to two years – at the same time a gap is finally being closed, since the protection against dismissal and redundancy ends four weeks after the child’s second birthday,” was emphasized. The SPÖ basically saw its own demand implemented. Currently, state kindergartens in Lower Austria can only be attended from the age of two and a half years.
Among other things, the Social Democrats advocated free afternoon care in the state kindergartens. The SPÖ was helped by Udo Landbauer, the state party and club chairman of the FPÖ Lower Austria.
He described nationwide and free afternoon care as a “question of political will”, the implementation of which has been blocked by the ÖVP “for years”. Landbauer would also like to see the extension of parental leave until the child is three years old “to strengthen freedom of choice”.
Teschl-Hofmeister: “The opinion of the experts is also important”
“We had another good appointment with representatives of the governing parties on the future of childcare and were able to exchange projects and ideas. Not only the ideas of the political parties are important to us, but also the view of the experts in this area, who check the possible political initiatives for the benefits for the families and the feasibility. Prof. Mazal from the Austrian Institute for Family Research also made his expertise available today in this round. After all, childcare is an essential issue for the future of our society – a question that many families, parents and grandparents ask themselves. Provincial Governor Johanna Mikl-Leitner and I see it as one of the central tasks of the Lower Austrian provincial government to help our compatriots,” says Provincial Family Councilor Christiane Teschl-Hofmeister.