Sussan Ley (Farrer, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Adelaide, the shadow minister, for her questions. I am happy to address some of the key points she has raised. The answers to all of those questions she raised around childcare benefit and childcare rebate could be found in the speech I made to the House both on the introduction of the bill earlier last week and the summing up speech this afternoon. I am happy to go over them again in the order that they were asked. I will address first the family day care matter.

It is interesting because the shadow minister was in fact the minister in 2012 when the Australian National Audit Office did an audit of the Community Support Program, which assists family day care. This was a program that was only in existence after 2006 following which it exceeded its budget allocation significantly year after year. In fact, it was spiralling out of control in excess expenditure. So the audit office highlighted problems and recommended a review. The minister, now the shadow minister, sat on her hands and did nothing. It was a part of Labor's mess that we had to clean-up on coming to government.

The shadow minister asks about consultations with the secretary. I am happy to inform her that yesterday I had a very wide-ranging, productive discussion following on from earlier conversations, earlier discussions and earlier meetings between ourselves, the department and the sector. But I would like to let the shadow minister know that yesterday I had a particularly productive session with family day care stakeholders. The reality is that although this is a budget measure this year, this is not coming in for 12 months. There are no changes for 12 months and we will work together with the sector to support and to have strong family day care. With no changes the 12 months, the transition is workable, manageable and well-supported by the sector.

Remember that Labor did nothing to fix this problem. There were several problems that Labor did nothing to fix, but the main problem that we dealt with in the House today was the bill that we put through the lower House that paused the thresholds for the child care benefit and the child care rebate. Speaker after speaker, including the shadow minister in her question just now, referred to these changes as 'cuts'. In fact, they are not cuts. It is disingenuous, it is misleading and it is scaremongering to the parents Australia to describe something that pauses a threshold, which is a level of income at which you qualify for a certain benefit, as a cut when it simply is not.

People listening to the member for Adelaide would assume that the hourly rate of child care benefit that they are entitled to in the various circumstances they have their children in are actually going to reduce. In fact, they are not. They are going to increase. That is because the quantum of that subsidy directly to the parents will continue to be indexed. The shadow minister knows that. In making political point after political point and rhetorical flourish after rhetorical flourish, she is in fact simply stating untruths.

The sheer hypocrisy of the stance that has been taken by Labor really is—and I know it is an overused word—breathtaking. That is because contained in the bill that went through the House today was the measure to pause the child care rebate. This was a measure that was introduced by Labor in its last budget. It was desperate to find savings. It knew that the sixth surplus that it predicted was not going to happen. There were six non-surpluses in a row. So it pulled savings out of midair—savings from everywhere. There were $106 million in savings from pausing the child care rebate. They paused the child care rebate for six years, but they did not actually put the legislation through to effect that. We were left to do the dirty work and to pick up the pieces.

As I said in the House today, it gives me no pleasure to be bringing in the savings that we know, as a responsible government, that we have to make. It gives me no pleasure at all, but I perfectly understand that the job has to be done. By putting in place Labor's own measure—which it did not have the guts to legislate and then made excuses about—and another sensible, moderate measure that simply lasts for three years until we get the budget back under control, we are participating in putting Australia back on a sustainable path. If anybody is interested in the child care needs of the modern economy in which we all live and work, then they must surely be interested in the health of that economy, in the productivity of that economy, in the participation of women in the workforce, in the health of families and in the quality of child care for children. All of these things are front and centre.

I acknowledge that all members of the House want those things. We completely disagree on how we will get there. We absolutely take responsibility for the work that we are doing, the Productivity Commission inquiry that we are having and the new policy ideas that will come in just a few months, which will look into bringing in legislation with new initiatives next year. There is an exciting future. I do hope that the shadow minister is not going to hold us back.

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