Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank the member for Bennelong for his question and his tireless advocacy for families right across his community. From its first day in government, the Albanese Labor government has been working hard to improve paid parental leave for working families because, on this side of the House, we know that improving paid parental leave is a critical reform. We know paid parental leave is vital to the health and wellbeing of families, parents and children. Not only is it good for families but it's also good for our economy. One of the best ways to boost productivity and workforce participation is to provide more choice and more support for families and more opportunity for women.

Each year, around 180,000 families across the country will benefit from our government's investment in paid parental leave, which totals a $2.3 billion investment across our three budgets. First we made the Paid Parental Leave scheme more accessible and flexible and we encouraged shared care. Then we passed legislation to expand the scheme to a full six months by 2026. But, of course, we are not stopping there. Tomorrow, I will introduce legislation to the House to pay superannuation on government paid parental leave. Not only is our government providing immediate support to Australians with a new baby, but we are boosting their retirement savings. Our reforms on paid parental leave have been widely welcomed, including by The Parenthood, who said this is a 'significant improvement' after 'no meaningful change' to policy over the last decade.

I have been asked about what approaches have been rejected. Of course, the approach that we have rejected is the approach that those opposite took when they were in government. The Leader of the Opposition was part of a cabinet which, over two successive terms in government, attempted to cut $1 billion from Paid Parental Leave and take that from the pockets of families. Their policy to cut Paid Parental Leave went beyond just bad policy, though. Those opposite showed their true attitudes towards working women when they accused them of being double-dippers, fraudsters and rorters for just having the gall to access both their Paid Parental Leave and their workplace entitlements. Their lack of understanding about the importance of paid parental leave for women's workforce participation still prevails and, in response to our improvements, we've seen Senator Paterson and Senator Hume characterise paid parental leave as welfare as opposed to a workplace entitlement. Those opposite have nothing positive to offer. Only Labor will get up and improve paid parental leave.

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