Improving safety at family day care residences or venues with swimming pools, spas and water features in Western Australia

Following a Coronial inquest into the drowning death of a toddler at a family day care residence in 2015, the Coroner made several recommendations regarding family day care services that operate in residences or venues with swimming pools, spas and water features. The Department of Communities conducted extensive public consultation and a regulatory impact assessment process to develop options to address those recommendations. The preferred options required changes to legislation.

Regulations to improve safety in family day care with pools and spas

The new regulations to implement the recommendations from the Decision Regulatory Impact Statement came into effect from 1 September 2022.

These regulations will:

• prohibit approved providers from engaging new educators with pools or spas
• allow approved providers to engage an educator transferring from another service under certain circumstances, with the approval of ECRU
• require the approved provider to undertake monthly inspections
• require the approved provider and educators to keep copies of inspection reports
• introduce requirements for reporting any safety issues identified at family day care residences or venues to ECRU
• require all family day care residences or venues to have an additional communications device in a fixed location suitable for use during emergencies
• require family day care residences or venues with a pool or spa to have a safety device installed.

The last requirement for safety devices commences six months (i.e. from 1 March 2023) after the other requirements to give educators ample time to source and install an appropriate device.

More information is also provided in the Frequently Asked Questions below.

If you would like further information, please contact ecru@communities.wa.gov.au.

Online inspection training for Approved Providers

Monthly inspections of family day care residences or venues with a pool, spa or hazardous water feature were one of the key recommendations from the Decision Regulatory Impact Statement released in 2020.

The Department of Communities engaged the Royal Life Saving Society of WA (RLSS WA) to develop an online training course for approved providers and their staff. This training is provided to assist approved providers with conducting inspections of family day care residences or venues with a pool, spa or hazardous water feature.

This training is free of charge. People who complete the training will have a good understanding of what is required in undertaking monthly inspections, how to check safety barriers and the environment around a pool or spa for safety issues and how to comply with the reporting requirements.

The regulation requiring monthly inspections came into effect from 1 September 2022.

Links to register for the online training course were emailed directly to Approved Providers.

This training is being provided on a ‘train the trainer’ basis to skill up staff who will be responsible for undertaking inspections and training others. Providers should ensure their staff develop competency and familiarity with these requirements so that in the future they can train their staff internally in how to undertake inspections. This is similar to the requirement to undertake risk assessments of family day care residences every year where approved providers are expected to train their staff in how to undertake these appropriately.

A report template and handy checklist for inspections is provided below for providers to use in both a Word and PDF format. Providers may adapt the template to make it suitable for their use but should ensure all information listed is included.

A daily safety checklist is also provided to help educators manage their safety requirements.