“Nationwide diversity of providers looks different,” said Helmut Fink, Vice President of the Humanist Association of Germany, on Thursday in response to the first report by the Federal Statistical Office on the finances of privately-run daycare facilities.
For the first time, this specialist report provides current data on the financial situation of child day care facilities run by independent providers. One background to this is the planned expansion of child daycare in Germany in order to guarantee the legal entitlement to a childcare place from August 2013. The report came to the conclusion that independent providers are important for child daycare. “Different provider profiles represent a welcome choice for parents and their children,” Helmut Fink began by emphasizing. He said that the association has been consciously and successfully involved as an independent provider in the field of childcare and child education for many years. Fink: “For us, humanism is not just a theoretical world view, but proves itself in the daily practice of life.” In order for a real choice to be possible, “there must not be a monopoly of a single provider to which all parents must then take their child due to a lack of alternatives”, he reminded the audience. “However, for historical reasons, the diversity of providers is unfortunately still far from being sufficiently realized in some areas of Germany.” He referred to the situation in regions where there are hardly any or no other independent providers in addition to church-run facilities. “Such monopolies must be dismantled in order to be able to adequately realize the purpose of independent sponsorship as provided for in our Basic Law.” Although the expansion of daycare centers is supported by the special fund for childcare expansion, in many regions the state funding only benefits a small group of church-run providers. “Fair competition requires choice through diversity of provision,” says Fink. In order to really exploit the potential of independent providers in Germany, it is not only the monopolies in the childcare sector that need to be dismantled. A sufficient number of training facilities for educational professionals is also an important issue that has been neglected by politicians for too long. “As a result, there is now an acute shortage of skilled workers in this area in many parts of Germany,” criticized Fink. “In addition, although there are many training institutions in church hands, there are still hardly any with a secular and humanistic profile.” This is therefore an important task for politicians. “Diversity should be seen as indispensable, especially when it comes to children and early childhood education. So if all independent providers and not just some church and denominational providers are important, the foundations for fair competition must finally be created. One that no longer blocks the potential and commitment of non-religious and humanistically-minded people in childcare and the training of professionals, but instead makes use of it.”
