The Legal Resources Centre secured a High Court order on 23 June 2026 compelling the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education to pay long-overdue subsidies to early childhood development centres.
The KwaZulu-Natal Division of the High Court in Pietermaritzburg accepted a draft order requiring the department to file a report listing all ECD centres owed subsidies within one month of service. It must then pay the full amounts within one month of filing that report and submit updated reports every three months until compliance.
The court also recognised that all children in South Africa have a right to early childhood development. It declared the department’s irregular and inconsistent subsidy payments unlawful, unconstitutional and invalid.
Kiara Govender, an attorney at the Legal Resources Centre, said the matter had gone largely unopposed. “We have never heard from the department at any point,” she noted. Department spokesperson Muzi Mahlambi said the department had noted the judgment and would engage with it.
ECD practitioners protested outside the court, with some centres facing up to a year of unpaid subsidies. The current subsidy rate is R24 per child per day.
