Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Disability Reform) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Corangamite very much for his question, as he knows this government is all about spreading the benefits of the boom, especially to those families who have been finding it difficult making ends meet.

Just last Wednesday families started receiving money from the household assistance package—up to $110 per child per family for families on family tax benefit part A, and up to $69 per family for those on family tax benefit part B. We want to make sure that families get this extra assistance before the carbon price starts on 1 July, and we also want to make sure that it is the big polluters that pay the carbon price, not Australian families. What we know from those opposite is that all they intend to do is to claw back this assistance from Australian families and from pensioners.

I am also very pleased to let the House know that, from 20 June, families will be receiving the first round of the schoolkids bonus—opposed by each and every one of those opposite. From January next year at the start of term 1 we will start paying the first part of the schoolkids bonus, and the second part will be paid in term 3. This will amount to $410 per child for those in primary school and $820 per child for those in secondary school. This means that one million Australian families will get more money as a result of this government's change and the introduction of the schoolkids bonus.

The Treasurer also announced in the recent budget that families are going to receive another increase next year as part of our spreading of the benefits of the boom. Families on the maximum rate of family tax benefit will get up to $600 extra if they have two children or more. This government is all about spreading the benefits of the boom, but all those opposite say to each and every one of these measures is a great big 'no'. We have just seen from the Victorian government that, while we are introducing a new schoolkids bonus, the Victorian Liberals are just getting rid of their school start bonus. We are helping families: all those opposite can do is hurt them.

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