Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Gilmore for her question. I do not know whether she should have insulted the member for Macarthur’s question, but there we have it. Can I say to the member for Gilmore that the force of our youth allowance reforms is that students will be under less pressure to find work in a gap year—less pressure because more of them will qualify through the parental income test. I absolutely acknowledge that the current system, set up by the Howard government, which saw regional and rural participation rates in higher education go down, is constructed so that young people who want to qualify for youth allowance basically receive the message that the only way they can do that is to take a gap year and work. That situation has come about because the parental income test is so low, people do not qualify on family income, so they take the gap year, find a job and qualify that way. As the member for Gilmore rightly pointed out, the problem with a system that is geared like that is, obviously, there are parts of our economy where it is much harder for young people to find work, and many regional towns are like that.

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