Licensing criteria for home-based ECE services

Section 10 of the Education and Training Act 2020(external link) defines home-based ECE services as the provision of education or care, for gain or reward, to children who are under the age of 5 years, or who are aged 5 years but not enrolled at school, in:

  • the children’s own home; or
  • the home of the person providing the education or care; or
  • any other home nominated by a parent of the children.

These services are licensed in accordance with the Education and Training Act 2020 under the Education (Early Childhood Services) Regulations 2008(external link), which prescribe minimum standards that each licensed service must meet. Licensing criteria are used to assess how the services meet the minimum standards required by the regulations.

For each criterion there is guidance to help services meet the required standards.

The publication of the criteria on its own can be downloaded as a PDF [PDF, 1.3 MB] and printed.

The licensing criteria were last updated in September 2022.

Appendix 1: First aid requirements for criterion PF15

First aid kits should include the following (or these items are available on the premises):

  • disposable gloves
  • sterile saline solution (or some other means of cleansing wounds)
  • safety pins, bandage clips or tape (or some other means of holding dressings in place)
  • sterile wound dressings, including sticking plasters
  • rolls of stretchable bandage
  • triangular bandage (or some other means of immobilising an upper limb injury)
  • scissors
  • tweezers
  • cold pack
  • first aid manual
  • National Poisons Centre phone number - 0800 POISON / 0800 764766
  • Healthline phone number - 0800 611 116

The first aid kit may also contain any Category (i) medicines the service chooses to use, providing the appropriate written authority has been gained from parents (see Criterion HS25).