Pearsall contains 1 Long Day Care centre (71 places) and 1 OSHC facility (60 places), while overall provision relative to the local child population appears limited compared to national benchmarks, and is below the Greater Perth average. With no preschool/kindergarten services observed in the area (such services generally provided within schools in WA), only long day care, the ratio of children per place for the under 5 age group is 3.6 - placing the area among the bottom 20% nationally for supply per child. To meet the Greater Perth average 57 new places would be required (LDC+PSK to service the under 5 age group). Meanwhile, projected population decline of 3.9% in the under 5 age group between now and 2041 suggests a reduction in demand for childcare services. Other factors relevant to demand worth noting are high female labour force participation of 72.1%, as well as strong employment performance.
In assessing child care markets local school supply is a particularly important factor, given school-run convenience, and enrolment vs child care place analysis can provide useful insight into capacity both for parents seeking child care options and child care operators assessing opportunities in an area. The catchment sees a level of school enrolment relative to population of 14.0 per 100 residents with 611 enrolments across primary and secondary institutions. This above-average concentration of school places suggests the area serves as something of a destination for educational services, which typically supports elevated childcare demand through school run convenience patterns. Additionally, the level of school places per child care place (LDC+PSK) is higher than average. Rather unsurprisingly, out of school hours child care - serving school age children - was found to be much more abundant than other service types in the area. Fee analysis shows fees are notably lower than national averages. Another finding worth noting is the low level of commercial activity in the area and assessment of local working populations which suggest many of the local population commute elsewhere for work with nearby services potentially taking some pressure off local child care centres.
3 school catchments intersect Pearsall (note; school catchment data provided for public schools only), in which a combined 4,246 children aged under 5 reside, served by 2,585 LDC and preschool places. The overall demand-to-supply ratio across these catchments is 1.6 children per place, with limited variance in this ratio. Meanwhile, the discrepancy in this ratio between Pearsall and the intersecting school catchments highlights the need for a catchment based approach for specific site assessments.