The homework advice will expire next Tuesday, if the plans of the cabinet continue. Parents will then probably rely even more on childcare. But: there has been increasing staff shortages there for at least a year, according to a report of the sector organization Kinderopvang Werken. Last year, more than a hundred organizations in the sector sent a burning letter to the State Secretary because of these shortages.
For example, 71 percent of day care locations suffered from a shortage of pedagogical staff last autumn; in May 2021 this was still 55 percent. This increase can also be seen in out-of-school care: 70 percent in May 2021 had to deal with a staff shortage, four months later that had increased to 79 percent. The shortage is mainly due to absenteeism due to illness and the outflow of staff.
The industry went down last summer for the first time in twenty years strike because of dissatisfaction with the high work pressure that has arisen among pedagogical staff. Meanwhile, the shortages continue to increase, and with it the waiting lists for families.
15 months on the waiting list
For example, Miriam Steensma’s 2-year-old son has been on the waiting list since June last year at a childcare location of Tinteltuin, an umbrella organization with more than ninety daycare centers and out-of-school care locations in the Amsterdam, Zaanstreek and Waterland regions. It looks like a spot will become available for him in October, more than fifteen months after registration.
In the meantime, the family has been looking for ways to arrange childcare themselves. For example, mother Steensma has temporarily paused her education as a teaching assistant, so that she can babysit her son and daughter Lexi (5 months old) during the day. She has also chosen to work in the evenings.
“I really like the job, so that’s not the issue,” she said in the NOS Radio 1 News. †But I would also like to put them to bed. Dad does that, three evenings a week.”
‘Common problem’
Location manager Maureen Matser of Tinteltuin understands the problems faced by families like Steensma’s. “It’s a joint problem,” she says. “We also find it very annoying.”
Emmeline Bijlsma of the Childcare Branch Organization, with 1055 affiliated childcare locations, is also aware that childcare locations are running into shortages. “The staff shortage will continue and only increase according to forecasts,” she says. “That is synchronized with the overstrained labor market in several sectors.”
Striking employees of reception centers stopped working last summer to protest against the high work pressure. Check out some images of that protest below:
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