Deborah O'Neill (Robertson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs. How will Australian families benefit from the government’s new paid parental leave scheme?

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I very much thank the member for Robertson for her first question and congratulate her on her outstanding election and her fantastic first speech yesterday. Like her, this government is so pleased to be delivering Australia’s first paid parental leave scheme. From tomorrow parents expecting a baby in the new year will be able to apply for paid parental leave. I know every parent who is in this House would understand just how busy it is when a new baby comes into the family, so what we are doing is changing the arrangements so that parents can apply for paid parental leave and family tax benefit three months before the due date of their baby’s birth. So this will be a very positive move for families.

Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Hockey interjecting

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Just to make sure that the shadow Treasurer understands: Australia is finally catching up with the rest of the developed world and delivering our first national paid parental leave scheme—never done by those opposite; 12 years they had in government to deliver paid parental leave and of course they refused. We will be delivering this scheme from 1 January next year. Eligible Australian parents will be able to get 18 weeks of paid parental leave paid at the federal minimum wage. This has been a very, very long time coming and will be particularly welcomed by casual workers, part-time workers and those self-employed workers and contractors who at the moment do not have access to paid parental leave.

I recall meeting a young family in Sydney not long ago, both of the parents working in casual jobs. They had had a baby who needed to stay in hospital because of health complications, they were trying to manage being in the hospital with their newborn baby, with both of them doing shift work. The mother was trying to breast-feed her baby. She had no access to paid parental leave. In the end she just could not do it any longer and had to give up her job. It is for families like this that this government is delivering Australia’s first national paid parental leave scheme, because at the moment less than a quarter of women in low-paid and casual or part-time jobs have paid parental leave compared to three-quarters of women on higher wages. This is a major change for Australian families, one that we are so pleased to be able to deliver. Of course we announced during the election campaign that we were going to make an additional change that will be particularly beneficial for dads. Dads will be able to get extra paid paternity leave so that they too can spend more time at home with their newborn baby. We know this Leader of the Opposition was famously heard to say that paid parental leave would happen over his dead body, but it is this government that is delivering.

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The minister will return to the question.

Jenny Macklin (Jagajaga, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This Labor government will deliver for Australian families.