Should they be allowed to play with the iPad before they can crawl? When can they use permanent markers unsupervised? Is it ever OK to let them wear socks with sandals?

But the one thing that all Australian parents can agree on is that childcare should be a way easier process.

They call it the great barbecue stopper, but it's actually more of a gender equality, childhood development and productivity stopper. According to the Productivity Commission, there are an estimated 165,000 parents (mostly mothers) out there in Australia, who would like to work, or work more hours, but cannot because of childcare difficulties.

The government is not unaware of the issue. Both sides of politics know that making childcare a happier experience not only wins votes but generates more taxpayers. And over the past ten years, federal childcare funding has almost tripled to about $7 billion a year, covering two thirds of costs in the process. Yet, the great childcare problem still persists.

So the Coalition went to the last federal election with a plan to have a plan to fix the issue. One of its commitments was to have the Productivity Commission report within 12 months of the election on "how the childcare system can be made more flexible, affordable and accessible".

It duly came back to the government last October. And on Friday, after much, much anticipation, the final document was released for all the world to see.

The report is a whopper: 1000 pages of recommendations, graphs, tables and key points, following more than 2000 submissions and comments.

And yet it has landed with something of a sinking feeling. It is no silver bullet. It's not even a water pistol.

To be fair, the final version is not radically different from the draft whopper that was released last July. Both recommended that the current system of multiple childcare payments be combined into one subsidy that is means tested and directed at lower and middle income families. And both recommended that federal funding be given to nannies and kept for preschools.

One small difference can be seen on page 41 of the draft, in which the commission argues that "there may be a case" for "diverting" some of the funding for Tony Abbott's $5.5 billion paid parental leave scheme into childcare, "where significant benefits are likely".

While the final report "finds" that if the government wants to increase workforce participation, this would be more effectively achieved through "additional" childcare funding than changing the PPL, this was not seen as strong enough.

Reaction from the childcare and community sector was swift. Group after group came out; arguing that in order to make genuine change in the sector, and not just shift things around, then more funding is needed. Indeed, the expected workforce participation boost from the proposed changes is just a teeny 16,400 more mothers working.

There is also concern that if you base government assistance on the median hourly rate – as the PC recommends – then by definition, there will be a whole bunch of people who will lose out, because they are already paying more than that.

The Commission could be forgiven for feeling a bit hard done by here. After all, it did the right thing and reported back within the terms of reference (the government had not been pleased about the draft effort in this respect). But the playing field has moved on since it finalised its report four months ago. It may be hot off the public press, but it is already outdated.

Since the report was submitted in October, the government has gone from being painfully committed to Abbott's PPL scheme and adamant that it would not give any more funding to childcare, to sliding away from the PPL and then dumping it. And to making serious noises about boosting funding for little kids (if it can find the funds/ and get Labor on board).

In the meantime, the childcare minister has changed and so has the relative importance of the policy. The low-profile Sussan Ley has been replaced by the very high-profile Scott Morrison. And childcare has gone from something that was well down the pecking order to the potential butt-saver of the Abbott government.

And so, the PC report has been left like a dust-gathering shag on a rock.

Or as Morrison politely put it, when asked if there was extra work needed to come up with his new childcare policy: "I would say the report provides a key milestone".

Judith Ireland is a Fairfax Media journalist