Citing deaths of two babies at unregistered creches in recent months, Patricia de Lille, the MEC for social development in the Western Cape is coming up with an amnesty period during which the unregistered creches in the province will get themselves registered with wither her department or the City of Cape Town.

The amnesty period will last for six months - from February 1 to July 31 and only already operating partial-care facilities are eligible to get registered, as told by De Lille. She added that anyone who desired to start a new facility after 1 February 2011 would firstly have to submit an application and then would have to fulfill criteria laid down in the Children Act.

According to section 76 of the Children's Act, a centre which is taking care of more than six children will be taken as a child-care facility.

At presently, the province has around 1 333 unregistered facilities. They need to be regulated as the number of discarded children has been rising. The registration can get done at libraries, clinics, sub-council offices of the Cape Town, the head office of the provincial department and at local offices.

"We make a passionate plea with all the partial care facilities to ensure a safer environment for our children", said Cape Town mayor Dan Plato.