The first round of funding available under the new Community Child Care Fund – an element of the new child care system introduced under the Jobs for Families Child Care package – is now open for applications.
The open competitive grant opportunity offers grant funding from $10,000 up to $200,000. The open competitive grant opportunity is one of two streams of funding offered under the CCCF. The other stream is a restricted competitive grant opportunity which includes a quarantined funding amount of $61.8 million targeted specifically at ensuring the viability of services currently funded under the Budget Based Funding (BBF) program. The restricted competitive grant opportunity has not yet opened.
The Community Child Care Fund is part of the Child Care Safety Net, and offers additional funding to eligible child care services to:
- reduce the barriers in accessing child care, in particular for disadvantaged or vulnerable families and communities;
- provide sustainability support for child care services experiencing viability issues;
- provide capital support to increase the supply of child care places in areas of high unmet demand.
Funding available under the Community Child Care Fund is additional to the Child Care Subsidy, which is the core stream of funding available under the new child care system. Other funding streams under the Child Care Safety Net include the Additional Child Care Subsidy and the Inclusion Support Programme.
There are three categories of funding available under the open competitive round:
| CCCF Element | Minimum Grant Funding Amount* | Maximum Grant Funding Amount* | Total value of CCCF grant funding available under this Grant Opportunity (up to) |
| Sustainability Support | $10,000 | $200,000 | $50 million** |
| Community Support | $20,000 | $100,000 | |
| Capital Support | $50,000 | $150,000 |
To be eligible to apply for the open competitive grant opportunity a service must be:
- An approved provider of an approved child care service; AND
- An organisation which is either:
- Seeking funding for an approved child care service operating in a priority area; OR
- Seeking funding for an approved child care service currently in receipt of funding under the department’s Community Support Program.
Applications for the open competitive grant opportunity close 5 October 2017 at 2.00 pm AEDT.
The funding guidelines for both the open competitive grant opportunity and the restricted non-competitive grant opportunity are available via the Australian Government’s grant information system.
