A new financial disaster !

Just as falling interest rates are promising relief for hard pressed families coping with big mortgages - a new financial disaster is about to descend on working women.

ABC Learning centres have called in the receiver. They owe $ 1.1 billion to the banks and the Federal government has granted an emergency injection of $ 22 million to keep their doors open until the end of this year.

The problem is the sheer size of ABC Learning. They have a twenty-five percent market share and run 1075 centres. They employ 16,000 people - and serve 25,000 children.

Early analysis shows that about forty percent of their centres are running at a loss, making them unattractive to competitors as a take over target. Unfortunately many of these unprofitable centres are located in areas of greatest demand where alternative accommodation is least likely to be available.

As an added problem for the Federal government, there is a real question over the entitlements of those sixteen thousand ABC Learning employees. The sum owed for wages, holiday payments, long service leave - and redundancy payments if centres close - is enormous.

The government has ruled out taking over and running this entity as a going concern. That is a wise decision. The moment the bureaucracy gets involved costs blow out further and red tape ensures it becomes just another bottomless money pit.

On the other hand, to see a quarter of the child minding places in this country close their doors would be a total disaster for working women.

There would be no hope of displaced children being accommodated elsewhere and the result would be some women being forced to give up their jobs - and the emergence of an underground, unregulated child minding regime forced on desperate people torn between the need to work and an impossible alternative.

There is no clear solution to the problem. Between now and the first of January next year the government will need to provide direction - and probably a lot of money - to induce a mix of existing competitors, new entrants, various charities , councils and civic groups to enter the fray and take over services.

It will need to act quickly - because if the new year arrives without clarity there will be a panic that further fractures an already fragile economy !