Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Education) Share this | Hansard source

I begin by welcoming the decision to restore the Women's Budget Statement this year. Bob Hawke introduced the Women's Budget Statement in 1984, driven by the marvellous Susan Ryan, who we lost too young. At that time, it was a world first and for decades after it was a proud local tradition; until, of course, Tony Abbott abolished it in 2014. After eight years, this statement is an admission that government policy can affect men and women differently and that, unless we measure these things, unless we pay attention to them, women inevitably fall behind. Tony Abbott knew that, I assume. He was the minister for women, after all. That's why he abolished the Women's Budget Statement in the first place. Since then, it's no surprise that this government has been failing the interests of Australian women.

This year has forced us to a reckoning with some of those failures. It's put a face to our problems—the brave face of young women who refuse to accept silence and who insist on demanding something better from us as their representatives: justice, respect and an equal voice at the decision-making table. That's what women are asking for, whatever their politics. Yet, we still live in a country where women are paid less than men for their work, where too many retire into poverty, where families can't afford child care and where violence is a terrible fact of life. I think what our discussions before the break told us, if anything, is that every woman has a story of sexual harassment, sexual violence or domestic violence—every single woman in this country has a story.

Insofar as there are policies in this budget which acknowledge these problems, we welcome them. There are a number of things here that we have called for and we support unequivocally. We welcome them and we hope that they have been designed and delivered in good faith. We hope that they're free of the suspicions and ideology that stopped the government taking these issues seriously for the past eight years. But you can understand why some Australian women are struggling to believe this Prime Minister's promises. They're looking at his record and assuming that this is just another political fix, because the government's record on women's policy does not inspire confidence.

Since the Liberal Party came to office, childcare costs have risen by a third. Nine hundred and forty thousand women have been forced to raid their superannuation accounts to survive the pandemic. A million women are looking for work. In fact, Australia has plummeted 26 spots down the international rankings for gender equality. We are now 50th in the world for gender equality. That is the lowest we have been since these records have been kept. It's only now, minutes to an election, after the Prime Minister has so profoundly lost the faith of Australian women, that these promises come.

This Prime Minister has never had trouble making promises. It's keeping promises that he struggles with. Already the details in this budget don't match the sunny promises he's given us. When you read these documents you see that the budget forecasts a drop in the number of Australian women in the workforce. It forecasts a pay cut for Australian women and a tax hike after the next election. You have always got to check the fine print with this guy, because, beyond the hype and beyond headlines, it's just not clear that any of these promises will actually be delivered.

Those opposite now say that they're going to implement the Respect@Work report, which we all know was sitting on the then Attorney-General's desk, gathering dust, for more than a year. And you think, 'Oh, well, better late than never.' Again, you hear the headline, 'We're accepting all the recommendations,' but when you read the fine print it's very far from the case. You learn, in fact, that the government is refusing to deliver on the most urgent changes recommended by the Respect@Work report. There's a pattern here, and they can't shake it.

Of course, Labor welcomes any additional funding for women's safety. We do. We welcome additional funding for women's safety, because wherever I go in this country, from Launceston to Newcastle to Rockhampton, what women's services tell me is that things have never been harder—literally, never been harder. It has never been harder to house women and their children trying to flee domestic violence. It has never been harder to get them the legal assistance that they need. Why is this only happening now, eight years in?

After almost a decade of reports, inquiries and royal commissions, with hundreds of recommendations ignored, why is it coming just weeks after the Family Court was abolished? We all know how important it is for people making decisions during family breakdowns to have a specialist understanding of the dynamics of domestic violence, something that the Family Court had. The Family Court's abolition was not wanted by anybody working in the area. Specialised family courts run by people that understand the dynamics of domestic violence are absolutely critical to keeping women and children safe. That's what all the evidence tells us. You look at decisions like this and it is a bit hard to take the Prime Minister's promises seriously.

It is more than just the policies and the gap between announcement and delivery. Over the last couple of days, the Prime Minister and those opposite have been asked to vote on the member for Bowman and his fitness to hold high office. At every opportunity they've had to put their votes where their rhetoric has been on keeping people safe and on, as the minister said, preventing the use of the internet to stalk and harass people and for coercive control and to call out this behaviour and stand against it, what have they done? They have voted to protect this guy, a taxpayer funded troll. They voted to protect an extra 22,000 bucks for him to keep his committee position. It is a bit hard on the one hand to say you want to take strong action and then on the other hand the minute you have the opportunity to take strong action and call it out to instead actually defend this guy. The guy has been caught upskirting a constituent! Honestly, what do you have to do to lose the faith of those opposite? You just have to shake your head, really, when you think about it, don't you? You just want to shake your head. What does it take?

I hope those opposite reconsider that, because, like I say, there are measures in this budget that we are very happy to support. But do they not understand that this sends the most mixed of messages to the women of Australia to say that it matters, that this stuff is important, but be prepared to defend a guy who is stalking, threatening, harassing and upskirting his own constituents?

I also want to say that, as Labor's shadow minister for women, I get what it is that we need to achieve for Australian women. But actually what's even more important is that we have a leader in the member for Grayndler who understands, a shadow ministry that understands and a caucus that understands. Having a critical mass of women in the parliament on our side changes things so profoundly. When I came into this place, we were about a quarter female on this side of the parliament. We now are close to half. It is such a profound difference not to have to explain from scratch every time one of these changes needs to be made.

We have a policy agenda ready to go from day one. Our childcare policy would make child care cheaper for 97 per cent of Australian families. Three-quarters of those who would benefit from Labor's policy will not benefit from the policy announced by those opposite—a million families with more affordable child care. Imagine what that would do not just for family budgets but for women's workforce participation and for the national budget. Imagine the difference that would make when we increase the rate of women's workforce participation. But we don't need to imagine it. We know that this would unleash billions of dollars of national wealth. We know, too, that Labor is committed to pay equity. We would strengthen the Fair Work Commission's ability to order pay rises for low-paid, female dominated industries.

So much has been said, quite rightly, over the last few days about the importance of getting the workforce right in aged care. We absolutely need to invest more in supporting people to choose aged care as a career and supporting them to stay in the career. That means paying decent wages. How can it be okay that you can earn more stacking shelves at Woolies than by caring for our oldest and most vulnerable Australians, or our youngest and most vulnerable Australians? It's just not right. We need the Fair Work Commission to be able to order pay rises for low-paid female dominated industries. We also need to give greater job security to casuals and gig workers, as our policy does.

On superannuation, we're committed to getting to the full 12 per cent, because we know that too many Australian women are retiring into poverty. The fastest-growing group of people moving into homelessness is single older women. On women's safety, of course we know that if you're working and you're trying to leave a violent relationship that you need that 10 days of paid domestic violence leave which Labor has committed to. That's to go to court, to give police statements, to change the locks, to get the kids sorted at school and to attend counselling or to come out of hospital. You need that 10 days of paid domestic violence leave. We don't want women to have to choose between their jobs and staying safe.

That's our promise: at work, in the family and in retirement we have an agenda for women, written by women. It wasn't written to solve a momentary political problem; it's an agenda that you can trust, because, for us, equality will never be an exercise in damage control. It's who we are and it's why our party exists. It's our simplest and our most important belief, that every Australian is born with the same value and with the same rights to safety, happiness and independence. When we fail to meet this standard—when we fall short of equality—it's bad for women but it's bad for men too, because equality is good for women and it's good for men too.

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