Christian Porter (Pearce, Liberal Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member opposite for his question. As mentioned earlier, there are about 1.5 million families that we could describe as family tax benefit families in the system. The question has been asked about some numbers, so I will give you some numbers: of those 1.5 million families, 720,000 have children of childcare age—between zero and five years. Of those 1.5 million families, 480,000 have children of after-school care age—aged six to 12 years. All of those families with children of those ages stand to benefit from generation-changing childcare reform—that is 720,000 out of 1.5 million; and 420,000 out of 1.5 million. We will get on to the Leader of the Opposition's number, so let me tell you this: there are one million children of long day care age, between zero to five years, inside the family tax benefit system. There are 1.2 million children of after-school care age, between six to 12 years, and the families of those children all stand to benefit from reform to child care.

Let me give you a few examples of how that reform might work: earlier on we heard about Kelly, whose youngest child was aged seven. If, for instance, you had two children aged six and over and were earning a low income of about $50,000, you would stand to benefit $239 a year, because you could access the reforms to child care that we have put on the table. What is fascinating is that we have devised a system where we can find appropriate savings inside the family tax benefit system and reinvest almost all of those into generational reform to child care. Members opposite also made some savings inside the family assistance system, you might realise. In fact, they made $23 billion worth of savings, and so—

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