Delays in police vets for early learning teachers are putting pressure on short-staffed centres. Photo / File
Early childhood centres already struggling to find teachers are losing potential staff as some police vetting checks can take up to six weeks.
An education recruiting agency is also calling for more police resources to refine and speed up the process so vacancies can be filled amid frustration and growing despair.
Police say they process about 600,000 requests a year and are actively looking for process and technology improvements to cut wait times.
But the purpose of the Police Vetting Service was to keep people and children safe.
"The risk is too high if we get it wrong," a police spokesperson said.
BestStart centres around the region had seen a spike in under-2-year-old enrolments and the slow vetting process for new staff was straining teams, chief executive Fiona Hughes said.
The current minimum teacher-to-child ratio was one-to-five while the ratio for older children was one-to-10.
She said the growth in the age group "hasn't been seen in a long time" and delays in vetting were causing "definite pressure".
She said vets were taking more than 20 days in some cases.
Education recruiting company ep.education's chief executive, Stuart Birch, said it had teachers wanting work and centres crying out for staff but their hands were tied until the vetting was done.
He wants more police resources and a better vetting system.
"Because vetting results are taking so many weeks to come through, ECE centres are under impossible pressure because teachers can't be sent out to work."
Ep.education, which works with large and small early childhood centres across the country, is often waiting weeks for police checks.
Birch said there had been occasions when by the time the results returned, the teacher had got sick of waiting and found a job outside the sector.
"Frustration and despair are growing as centres struggle to get the teachers needed to meet government staffing requirements."
Birch said the current situation could not continue and wanted the vetting team to "immediately" be given the resources needed to clear the backlog and help ensure centres could be fully staffed.
Pāpāmoa's Bloom Early Learning and Play office manager Hannah Hill said the slow process of vetting was something they had noticed.
She said they needed to put through an urgent police vet on several occasions when they needed staff and someone could start immediately.
She said the urgent process, as well as qualified teachers already vetted, helped ease strains as keeping up within ratios "can be pressuring" when there was such a wait to get new teachers in the door.
As they were aware of the delays in vetting, she said they tried to stay on top of staff numbers to avoid any "mayhem".
Rotorua's The Ole Schoolhouse Early Childhood Centre curriculum leader Eric Hollis said police vetting was an important part of keeping kids safe.
"It's only one of seven stages of the safety checking when you employ someone you don't know," he said.
He said while it was common knowledge how long a vet could take, the processing time was unpredictable.
"I've heard people waiting for six weeks ... I sent one two weeks ago and got it back in six hours."
A woman who began working at an early learning centre in Tauranga three weeks ago said the vetting process took about four weeks.
She works in admin and said the centre had let her know the process could take up to six weeks, so she knew what to expect, she said.
A Tauranga centre manager, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the lengthy waits made it "very hard" to get teachers into classrooms.
She said there was a shortage of qualified teachers but waiting up to six weeks for an unqualified teacher to be able to come inside was causing a strain.
She said the centre was currently working to get relievers lined up, especially coming into winter when teachers got sick but it wasn't a silver bullet solution.
"If we have staff leave, relievers then get full-time jobs ... and we can't guarantee how long they will stay."
Gate Pā's Kids Campus Childcare Centre manager Eunice Evans said the last vet they had was 10 months ago, and it was returned within a day.
She said their experiences had only been "excellent".
Lake Okareka Preschool manager Debbie Hayward said all their teachers were qualified and registered, which meant they were instantly vetted.
NZEI Te Riu Roa early childhood sector representative Virginia Oakly said she'd had teacher relievers miss out on work due to the slowness of police checks.
She said the issue was "one more symptom of the teacher shortage in ECE that needs urgent attention".
"The fundamental problem is the undervaluing of ECE and far too slow progress toward pay parity for all teachers in the sector."
Police vetting requirements and timeframes are set in legislation under the Children's Act 2014 and the Education and Training Act 2020.
Early learning services don't need to request a police vet for teachers, including relievers, who have a current practising certificate as this is done through the registration process through the Teaching Council.
Anyone else who will work during normal opening hours who may, or is likely to have, unsupervised access to children needs a vet - unqualified teachers, admin staff, teacher aides as well as contractors and employees of contractors.
An urgent police vet is available to urgently recruit new core children's workers to keep or increase staff ratios in a critical or crisis situation, according to the Ministry of Education's website.
A police spokeswoman said the vetting services processed about 600,000 requests per year for around 13,000 approved agencies nationwide, with a 20 working day service time.
Processing times fluctuated throughout the year based on a number of factors including the time of year and complexity of the request. The busiest period was January to April, and this year, they received 206,000 requests.
As of Monday, just under two-thirds of vetting requests were done within 20 working days and 93 per cent of all requests within 28 days.
She said they were actively looking for process and technology improvements to help reduce timeframes and improve the service.
They're also looking into how an individual can request their own vet and then share their result with multiple organisations. Police would maintain the validity of the vetting result to ensure the information remained up to date.
Current processing times are available on the police website.
Ministry of Education sector enablement and support deputy secretary Katrina Casey said they were aware of the delays in getting police vets and had advised teachers in a newsletter this week to plan ahead.
She said the ministry had a range of new targeted initiatives to help centres with their recruitment, including dedicated recruitment support and encouraging people into early learning teaching.
She said vetting was "essential" in keeping children safe, and was a requirement before starting work, needing to be renewed every three years.
Across the region, five centres have closed and 10 have opened, in the year ending June 30. Centres were not required to state the reasons they closed.
The number of ECE teaching staff - both qualified and non-qualified - has grown by 52 per cent between 2011 and 2020 from 20,100 to 30,400.
She said first-time teacher enrolments also increased three years ago.
Western Bay of Plenty District could have fewer councillors to vote for next election.