Sarah Henderson (Corangamite, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to continue speaking about the Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2014. I was speaking about the importance of this bill in cutting the regulatory burden on small business. From 1 July 2014 this bill provides that employees will be paid directly by the Department of Human Services, unless an employer opts in to provide parental leave pay to its employees.

Today I say to members opposite: think again about the burdens on small business. Think again about their needs and embrace this amending legislation, because it gives small business the choice. It gives an enormous advantage of some $44 million in savings to businesses and there is no merit for not agreeing to this amending legislation, as Labor has in the past.

Why are the government cutting red tape? Because it helps drive jobs. Small business is the engine room of our economy. Small business grows jobs, grows prosperity and builds confidence. We must take the regulatory burden off small business, to grow the jobs that our country needs. We understand how important this is. That is why we are abolishing the carbon tax and the mining tax. That is why we have an unashamed focus on our red tape repeal day. We want to do everything we can to boost small business and this bill is an important part of our firm strategy.

As I mentioned, the small business sector is the engine room of the Australian economy. When the Howard government was in power, around 53 per cent of people were employed in small business. Today, this number has dropped to only 43 per cent. Under Labor's watch, over the last six years, some 519,000 jobs were lost in small businesses across Australia. We are determined to reverse that. I ask members opposite to consider the cost of their continuing opposition of this important legislation.

There has been much misinformation about our Paid Parental Leave scheme from those opposite and in the media. Let me say this: Labor's campaign against our genuine Paid Parental Leave scheme shows how out of touch it is with what is happening across the rest of the world. Labor's Paid Parental Leave scheme is paid at the minimum wage for only 18 weeks. But the World Health Organization has identified 26 weeks as the minimum period of exclusive care for optimal maternal and child health outcomes.

I refer to the comments made by the former Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, the member for Jagajaga, last Thursday in this debate when talking about the importance of bonding with babies. What a shame she was not prepared to acknowledge that bonding requires the full recommended period of six months instead of short-changing women, to only 18 weeks.

Of the 34 countries in the OECD, 33 offer paid parental leave schemes. None of these countries derive its rate of payment of parental leave from the minimum wage. The scheme that Labor is sticking by demonstrates that we are lagging behind the world's economic powerhouses. Frankly, that is not good enough. It is not good enough for women, it is not good enough for families and it is not good enough for our economy. Our policy will allow Australia to catch up with the rest of the world and to lift our productivity.

I also want to draw the attention of the House to an article written by Anne Summers in The AgeandThe Sydney Morning Heraldon 6 May entitled 'Most mothers worse off on PM's leave scheme'. I referred earlier to how much misleading information there is in the media and this is yet one more example. This article contends that most mothers will be worse off. Unfortunately, Ms Summers has got her facts badly wrong. I actually addressed that in a letter to the editor. I want to put those facts on record here today. Ms Summers argued that 25 per cent of women who earn less than the national minimum wage will get a pay rise while on the current scheme, in contrast to low-paid women, who, under the coalition's scheme, will only receive leave calculated at their actual wage or, as she puts it, 'a raw deal.'

Ms Summers has got her facts badly wrong. The fact is that, under the coalition's scheme, mothers will be provided with 26 weeks paid parental leave at their actual wage or at the national minimum wage, whichever is the greater. Unlike Labor's scheme—and this is a very important difference—recipients of our Paid Parental Leave scheme will also receive superannuation.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, around 80 per cent of Australian women earn a salary of less than $62,400. The average salary for women who work full time is around $65,000. This means that women who earn the average full-time salary will be more than $21,000 better off under the coalition scheme because they will receive their actual wage over 26 weeks, instead of the minimum wage of around 18 weeks, and also because the coalition scheme includes superannuation. Under the government's scheme it also means that a woman earning the average full-time female salary of $65,000, who has a child at 26 years of age and another child at 29 years of age, will be around $50,000 better off in retirement than she would have been had she been under Labor's scheme.

The other very important thing that we will do is remove the ability to double-dip whereby recipients can access paid parental leave as well as their employer's scheme. This is a terrible waste and like so much of the waste we have seen under Labor we will address this double dip and eradicate it. We have made it very clear that paid parental leave should be a workplace entitlement and not a welfare payment. Prime Minister Abbott has every reason to celebrate the wonderful advances this policy will deliver for women, for families and for workplace productivity. So I say to the likes of Ms Summers that when it comes to adding up the benefits of the coalition's paid parental leave scheme Ms Summers's politically skewed assessment unfortunately has little credibility.

I also want to address some of the misleading statements that are continuing to be peddled by members opposite. Last Thursday we did hear this from the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, who made some disparaging statements in relation to millionaire plastic surgeons who receive paid parental leave. We have heard some similar comments from the member for Jagajaga. Like health care, all women should be entitled to paid parental leave. Let us not create a class warfare over a basic workplace entitlement. All babies matter, all families matter. So let us stop the attacks on some women and recognise that that first six months where a woman, and in some cases a man, has the opportunity to bond with their child is incredibly important, and our policy proudly stands by that incredibly important principle.

I also think it is very important to point out that, being a workplace entitlement and not a welfare measure, it is similar in fact to other workplace entitlements like sick leave, long service leave and carer's leave. Surely Labor is not proposing that those particular aspects of workplace leave be paid at the minimum rate. As the Prime Minister said last week, only two per cent of women in the workforce earn more than $100,000, so to characterise our scheme in the way in which members opposite are continuing to do does them no credit.

One of the great aspects of our policy that I am incredibly proud of is that we have included superannuation. I think every woman across this nation needs to understand that we are proudly incorporating superannuation in our paid parental leave scheme. As I have said, that will result in an incredible difference in terms of the way in which women will benefit from our scheme. Unfortunately, what we have seen from Labor is a scheme that does not reflect the recommendations made, it does not reflect what is going on in the rest of the world, and I very proud that we are championing a scheme that treats women seriously, that reflects the seriousness of women spending this valuable time with their children and makes such an important investment in workplace productivity.

Just like our paid parental leave scheme, our budget includes a range of important measures to help families. Over the next four years the Australian government funding for public hospitals will increase by some 40 per cent, more than $5 billion a year. The government is investing record recurrent funding of $64.5 billion in government and non-government schools over the next four years. Patients will be contributing $7 towards the cost of standard GP consultations but that is in order to make Medicare more sustainable. Let us not forget that 8.6 million concession card holders and children under 16 will only pay this contribution for the first 10 visits, so there is a very important safety net. We are abolishing the carbon tax, which will save households on average $550 a year. We are helping small businesses. We are cutting the company tax rate by 1.5 per cent, which will again give small business another important opportunity to cut costs and to grow jobs. We are creating the world's biggest medical research endowment fund, a $20 billion medical research future fund. We are proudly supporting young people who earn or learn. We are supporting older people going into the workforce by giving businesses an incentive of $10,000 to employ a person over 50 who has been unemployed for more than six months. So we are driving those incentives to support young people, to make them feel valued, to give them the confidence in the workplace, and investing in older people as well. We are very proud of the support that we are giving to mothers through our budget and in this wonderful paid parental leave scheme that we are championing.

Clare O'Neil (Hotham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Deputy Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity to make a contribution on this legislation. I do so today both as a member of parliament who represents an electorate of thousands of families and thousands of women who will be directly affected by the provisions of this legislation but also as a young mother and someone in this House who is probably going to be more affected by decisions about paid parental leave than most. It is in both of those capacities that I will be pleased to vote against the legislation that is before us. For those watching at home and up in the gallery, I will explain the impact of this particular piece of bill that is before us. This legislation is an element of the paid parental leave scheme that many of you have read so much about in the newspaper. The particular decision for us today is that which will move the responsibility for administering paid parental leave from the employer over to Centrelink.

There are two issues that I want to talk about today. The first is a very practical one: the impact of passing this legislation will mean that thousands of Australian men and women who are taking parental leave will have to deal with Centrelink instead of their employer in administrative questions and issues associated with PPL payments. It means waiting in queues and dealing with robotic phone systems and overall creating a system that is less user-friendly and more bureaucratic for the people that the scheme is designed to benefit. The second and much more fundamental issue with the bill before us today is that it has the effect of severing an important link between the employer and the employee while the mother, or the father in some instances, is off on parental leave. The reason that is important is that it runs so contrary to all the rhetoric we hear from the Abbott government about the importance of paid parental leave.

One of the central arguments that has been put forward by those on the other side of the House is that the increase to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme, the very generous Paid Parental Leave Scheme, will help improve female workforce participation. It will help mums get back into the workforce after having kids. If that is the purpose of this scheme, why then sever this critical link between mum and her workplace? Why then are we saying, through the law to employers, that the woman and her entitlement to paid parental leave is actually the government's responsibility not the employer's responsibility, which is supposed to be the central element of this scheme?

I will return to the issue of female workforce participation, but before I do that it is important to understand a little about Labor's scheme as a contrast to the one that we have before us. When Labor came into government, 55 per cent of Australian women had no paid maternity leave. It is a bit hard to believe today and we have obviously come so far in this debate. Today, 95 per cent of Australian women have access to paid maternity leave. It is one of the reforms that the last Labor government put in place that I think we can actually all be incredibly proud of. The scheme provided 18 weeks support at the minimum wage. Critically, it was the same for all mums. It recognised that having a baby or adopting a child does not get easier when you have less money. Many would argue that it comes with more challenges because you simply have fewer resources in the household to meet the issues that hit you every day in the first few months of having a child—less money for nappies, less money for baby clothes, less money for child care when the new mum or dad need a break. The scheme was not specifically designed for low-income mums; it was designed for all Australian women and in some cases men. But, in practice, we found that higher income women tend to have more power in the Labor market and hence were able to access paid parental leave through their workplaces. What we saw was that the median income of women accessing Labor's scheme was around $45,000 a year. So there was a really important equity element to that scheme—it was available to everyone; it gave everyone their fair share.

Another really important part of the scheme was that it was genuinely designed to keep women connected to their workplaces. This is absolutely crucial because it is an important part of meeting that goal of making workforce participation by women in Australia more equal. This is a critical challenge that faces our parliament over the coming years. Getting women to engage more equally in workplaces around Australia has an incredibly important economic element to it. Many in this place would know that the Grattan Institute has estimated that if women in Australia had the same workforce participation rate as women in Canada, our GDP would be about $25 billion higher by 2020. But there are massive gains to be made for women and that is why this is an area of particular passion for me. Many of us in this House would already be aware of these figures, but I will repeat them because they are so relevant. Women in Australia retire with about 40 per cent less superannuation than men. They face a gender pay gap of 17.5 per cent. They hold just 10 per cent of senior management positions in ASX 200 companies. Women in Australia are much more likely to be living in situations of poverty than men. We know that more equal engagement with the workplace is part of the solution to these problems. There are other benefits too.

It is important that we have our workforce in Australia as large as possible because, as we know, we have an ageing population and more workers will help us manage that. But there are also benefits for children. You would think that increasing female workforce participation would mean a significant increase to the flexibility, the quality and the affordability of child care. We know that if we provide great early-learning environments for our young people, we give them the best start to help see them through primary, secondary and hopefully on to tertiary study.

Both parties of course are aware that this is an issue for slightly different reasons. Both sides of politics are quite passionate about finding solutions. But we see that the current government have taken a very peculiar approach to dealing with the issue of helping women back into fulfilling professional roles. The first element is that they are attempting to put in place this massively generous scheme that will provide women with huge amounts of support for the first six months of the child's life. The second element is that this last budget has taken away lots of provisions that support women at home, seemingly in an attempt to bully women back to work by taking away payments for families and for single parents. Then we have a range of issues around the funding of child care, which I will detail in a few moments.

I believe that these approaches completely miss the mark. I talk to lots of mums as much as I can about what is holding them back in various different instances in going back into work. One of the biggest issues that mums talk to me about are the challenges that they face just transitioning back to work. It is often not after their first child that they face these challenges but when they have taken time off with their second child. They face a lot of issues finding roles that have the flexibility that they need to balance family life and professional life. Pregnancy discrimination is a huge problem in Australia that is very rarely discussed. We know that about one in five Australian mums experience pregnancy discrimination. Some studies estimate it at a lot more than that. Pregnancy discrimination last year was the No. 1 industrial issue raised by the Fair Work Ombudsman. Pregnancy discrimination was the most complained about industrial issue ahead of every other industrial problem that we hear about in this country. This is why the government should be doing everything it can to strengthen the links between employers and employees when parents are taking time off around having children. We need to make it clear to employers that it is part of their role to collaborate to help parents and especially to help women to make a smooth transition back into work. It is good for women, it is good for our workplaces and it is good for Australia.

That brings us back to this legislation which, as I have mentioned, will sever that critical link between the workplace and the mum or the dad who is taking time off. Since the beginning of Labor's scheme, payments were administered by employers. Removing that provision is a significant step backwards for Australian women. It is part of a scheme that most Australians, certainly most economists, believe is a significant step backwards for participation in the workforce by women. International evidence, and, of course, just common sense, suggests that the longer women step away from work, the more work they take on at home and the harder it is for them to get back into a fulfilling role. That is why I think this paid parental leave policy has the potential to entrench, not break down, gender divisions at home and at work.

So if the solution before us is not the right one, then what should we do? When you talk to women about what it is that they would like help with, when thinking about managing the difficulties of having a family and a work life, you get a pretty straight answer from them. What they tell you is that, if we want them to reach their potential at work, what really matters is not the first six months of a child's life; it is the many years that follow, where child care has to be juggled in the majority of Australian families where both parents work.

It is only when you start to make comparisons between child care and this Paid Parental Leave Scheme that is before us that the huge expense of this scheme comes to light. The cost of this scheme is $5 billion a year. That is hard to imagine for most people, who do not deal with those sums of money every day. Just consider that, last financial year, the federal government spent $4.7 billion on childcare supports. So we are actually going to be devoting more money to the first six months, to this scheme, than for women and all of the support that they would like for their children further down the line.

While we see this being implemented, there are elements of child care that are under attack. In the last budget, we saw some kindy funding removed, so that kids in my electorate of Hotham will only get 10 hours of kindy per week—one third less than the 15 hours enjoyed by their older brothers and sisters. Funding has been cut to the Community Support Program, which helps small family day care operators that provide child care to 80,000 Australian families. We know that the eligibility thresholds for childcare support have been frozen, which means that families who were previously eligible for support may not be eligible next year.

So the conclusion to all this is that the legislation before us, and the part that it plays in this broader Paid Parental Leave Scheme, is a huge policy faux pas. Even if it were good policy to implement a scheme like this one, it is madness to think that now would be the time to do it when we have had, in recent weeks, a budget handed down which has seen attacks on pensions; the removal of benefits, which will see many young people in Australia become homeless; the dismantling of our Medicare system; and changes to payments that will see the poorest in our society pay the most, not just as a percentage of their income but in actual dollar figures. Yet this scheme will see millionaires paid $50,000 to have a baby.

It is not the right priority for the budget. It is certainly not the right priority for women, to put all of our focus on the first six months when women tell us that what they really want help with are the years that follow. While we are doing all this, we create a scheme that severs, not strengthens, the ties between employers and employees. I must say that, even though I do think this policy is extremely contradictory, I am not all that surprised, because this is a government where a man who has a long history of anti-feminist views has appointed himself the minister for women, and where, amongst a raft of very talented backbenchers, only one woman could be found for the cabinet. So I think, given the context here, it is not really surprising that this government has got this area of policy so fantastically wrong. And I will be very pleased to vote against it when the time comes.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a pleasure to rise on this important bill, the Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2014. I would just note that the member for Hotham perfectly reflects the malaise and the confusion in the Labor Party about government and the role of government in our society. Not once did the words 'small business' pass her lips. She talked about consulting with families and women in her electorate but not with small business—the drivers, the engine room of our economy; those millions of enterprises employing all of our young people, and creating the jobs and innovation that we need in this country. 'Small business'—those words did not pass her lips once.

It shows a complete lack of understanding of the provisions of this bill, because this bill is primarily about lifting an administrative burden off small business and, importantly, the not-for-profit sector. This has nothing to do with changes to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme. This is an administrative amendment to save small business money—that is what this bill is about. But, as I say, the term 'small business' did not pass the member for Hotham's lips, and that is because the Labor Party do not understand small business; they do not understand its significance, and they do not care.

I also want to say that it is particularly disturbing to understand that the member for Hotham thinks that this is about the relationship between an employer and employee—a perfect reflection of the malaise in the Labor Party as to the role of government. This money that is paid to women in Australia through the Paid Parental Leave Scheme does not come from business. It comes from government—the money comes from government. The taxpayer pays for the Paid Parental Leave Scheme. And when the taxpayer pays for it, the government should administer it. It is breathtaking arrogance for the member for Hotham to suggest that it is a burden that should fall on the small business owner—that struggling person. The member for Hotham is laughing. But these people are on struggle street at the moment—these small enterprises; these family businesses. The economy is tough. Times are tough. It is hard to employ. It is hard to run a small business. People are working longer and longer hours. They are struggling under more difficult burdens of regulatory impact from the state and federal levels. It is a very difficult climate.

I speak to the business community in my electorate regularly, as well as to the families and, of course, all of the women in my electorate. But, listening to business, I understand that this is a significant burden on many of these businesses. That is what the facts show. An Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry survey showed that 84.3 per cent of businesses agreed or strongly agreed that government should not require employers to be the paymaster for the Paid Parental Leave Scheme. That is because we estimate that it is about $44 million of cost. It is not just the small business sector. It is also the not-for-profit sector.

But that, of course, has never come into the member for Hotham's consideration. It is as if, to the member for Hotham and the Labor Party, the government owns private civil society and private business: 'We can tell them to do whatever we want. We want to pay them money through the Paid Parental Leave Scheme; of course, it is business who should administer it, not the government.' But of course, when the government is footing the bill, when the taxpayer is providing the money, this administrative burden should fall on government agencies. That is where this should lie. It should be administered by Centrelink. It is cheaper to have it administered by Centrelink than to put the burden on the whole of the small business sector. It is better for small business. It is better for people in general that those businesses can continue to employ; can go better; can travel better in the economy; can pay their bills on time and function better as economic units than if they have to spend their days administering government policies.

Where does this end? Well, we do not know what the member for Hotham would envisage. If, every time a business had to provide government money to an employee, it should be administered by that business, then where does this end?

Is the member for Hotham saying we should extend all government payments to be administered by small business? How many days a week should small business owners work for the government unpaid? It is unanswered, because I do not believe the member for Hotham actually read this bill. I think she is talking about another bill that might come before this place, another change to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme, which of course is a different matter.

Today we are talking about the government's agenda to remove the red tape and regulatory burden on our small business sector in Australia. It is a significant problem. We have even heard from the Leader of the Opposition on red tape, who said:

We are committed, in a bipartisan spirit, to the organised and ongoing effort to minimise, simplify and create cost-effective regulation.

This bill is a great starting point. Why wouldn't the member for Hotham listen to the Leader of the Opposition saying that we need cost-effective regulation—$44 million of saving for the small business sector and the not-for-profit sector? Let us be clear about this: the not-for-profit sector is also going to save money under the amendments to this bill.

This is the kind of bill about which a sensible opposition—which in opposition understood what its role was in the Australian parliament and society—would say: 'We'll let this one go through, because it isn't sensible to oppose a bill that is lifting cost burdens off small business.' It is not sensible. It may take the opposition some years to learn this, but you do not just oppose everything that comes along just because it is funded. You do not conflate bills with each other when they do not go together. You do not put one bill, which is a good bill, that takes the administrative burden off small business, relieves the cost pressure and keeps our economy moving forward with other things you might want to oppose. That is what the Labor Party is opposing here—a sensible, deregulatory bill to lift the cost imposition off small business, return it to government where it belongs, that will cost the government only $7 million over five years as opposed to $44 million on individual private businesses, small business in the main.

This is a great way for the government to send a signal to the economy: 'Yes, we need you to spend that extra money you'll have in your pocket by taking on those extra hours for casual young people.' We have youth unemployment rising. We have difficulties with employment at the moment, and certainty and confidence. There can be no better signal than saying: 'Right. The government understands that small business is in a bind at the moment. We understand that the economy is not going well. We understand that we need to do everything we can to lift those practical day-to-day burdens off you. Those hours you are spending administering our paid parental leave scheme will be done by Centrelink.'

The member for Hotham says; 'This is terrible. People will have to get in touch with Centrelink.' This is a government payment. This is government money. It should be going through Centrelink. She does not address the fact that it costs business money to administer this scheme and, more importantly, it costs them time.

I know from my own discussions with a variety of small and medium businesses in my electorate and in Western Sydney that they are making up for the difficulties in the economy and in the regulatory environment by simply working longer and longer. Their quality of life is suffering. Many small business owners are saying: 'How can we get out of operating a business?' We have seen a decline in small business numbers and ownership rates. People are choosing to become employees again and not employers, because it is too difficult.

Where is the Labor Party on this question? What are they doing to assist Australians to own and operate their small businesses? They are not doing anything and, furthermore, today they are here opposing a commonsense measure to allow Centrelink to administer a government payment scheme. That is what we are proposing here today. It is absolute economic vandalism for the Labor Party to oppose a bill of this nature. It has nothing to do with any other changes to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme; it is simply to remove the administrative burden that was placed by the former government on small business.

It is also important to note Labor has a record here. The Minister for Small Business of course in opposition has proposed this amendment twice before; and the Labor Party has opposed it twice before. You did not hear the member for Hotham mention small business and you probably will not hear any of the other Labor members mention the words small business, even though they are the most significant employer and the heart of our economic survival in this country. They are ashamed to say that they are not supporting a bill that will remove the administrative costs and red tape burden on small business. Their heads are hitting the desk in shame.

Mr Snowdon interjecting—

Ms MacTiernan interjecting—

While I take the members' interjections, I think it is important to note that some people have criticised this bill on the grounds that, if you allow opt in, not many people will opt in. But the government is keen to allow for workplace flexibility, and it is important to note that many of the members' concerns opposite are fully addressed by this important part of the amendment—that is, if someone wants to retain the existing arrangements, employer and employee, they will be allowed to opt in. It is an opt-in scheme, giving the flexibility for people who want to retain their current arrangements. If small business owners and employees who currently have these arrangements find them effective, they can retain them if they want to—not those businesses who say, 'This takes a long time and it's very costly to my small business,' 'Gee, I would rather spend that money on new equipment' or 'Gee, I would rather spend that money on adding casual hours employing a young person for two or three more hours. If every small business in the country did that, we would have a lot less youth unemployment and a lot less drain on the public purse in terms of welfare payments and other things. The Labor Party will not consider here today that opposition to this bill will directly impact upon small businesses' ability to put extra young people on for casual hours and to do more of their essential economic activities by not allowing them to get on with their job, which is running their businesses.

It is important to note that the government has flexibility built into its scheme. It is important to note that the median hours identified by all organisations—that is, the average—was 22 hours. Of course that includes some larger organisations but that is still an enormous amount of hours for the median. Time is money is an old saying, and I know the Labor Party would not understand what that meant or what that referred to, but time is money in business—22 hours is a lot of money on average. That means some organisations are spending a lot more time administering the Labor government's scheme, working for the government and not being able to create, employ and grow. It is really quite shameful when you get down do it: imagine a small business spending several hours administering this scheme. Let's do something to alleviate the burden. Let's get on with ensuring small business spend its day focused on what it should be doing—its business and the functioning of its business. Let's be sure not to conflate this issue with other matters of paid parental leave and other matters of child assistance and support because this amendment bill has nothing to do with those issues. Every Labor member that gets up to speak about the government's proposed Paid Parental Leave Scheme or other matters is simply engaging in hyperbole. Those opposite know this is a good quality amendment.

This amendment is about lifting administrative burdens and costs off business and returning them to where they belong. Government payments belong in the administration of government, not on the backs of our small businesses and family businesses, which are the backbone of the Australian economy. Government administration belongs in government. This is an exceptionally good amendment. It is the government keeping its election commitments to lift the red tape regulatory burden off the backs of small and medium enterprises in our country and get them doing what they do best—that is, creating, growing and employing.

Alannah Mactiernan (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would really like to answer the questions raised by the member for Mitchell: what is the connection between this bill and the government's outrageous proposal for its Paid Parental Leave Scheme? There is a very clear nexus and a very clear reason why we need to oppose this bill before us today in order to take a stand on paid parental leave, because this bill is actually demonstrating the rank hypocrisy of the government on this matter. We have now got a series of student-politics-like stunts being attempted to be woven into a coherent policy. The bill we have before us today demonstrates very clearly that there is indeed no coherent consistent policy.

The bill we are dealing with today is a bill that would transfer the administration of the paid parental leave system to the government sector on the basis that 'all the other payments of government such as family tax benefits are all paid for by the government'. But when the Prime Minister is questioned as to why it is that this Paid Parental Leave Scheme is going to be such a generous scheme that it is going to allow women who are very wealthy to have an enhanced entitlement—

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What about women on the minimum wage?

Alannah Mactiernan (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The women on the minimum wage will get the minimum wage. The scheme is very unlike any other government payment because the more you earn, the more you get, which is completely contrary to the general payment scheme.

The justification that the Prime Minister always gives us for this little pet project of his is that this paid parental leave is a workplace entitlement; it is not a welfare entitlement and should be paid at people's wages in the same way that sick pay or holiday pay is paid at people's wages. This is a very different thing from any other benefit. According to the Prime Minister, this is scheme completely different and all those other benefits that were being alluded to by the member for Mitchell are to be assessed in a different way. As it is a workplace entitlement then clearly it makes sense for it to be an entitlement that is paid for by the employer—although quite clearly the employer has to be properly compensated in advance so that there are no cash flow problems as a result of having to pay this entitlement. Indeed, this notion that an entitlement like this should in fact be paid for through the employer is not something that has just been invented by the Labor government but, indeed, was the recommendation of the Productivity Commission. The Productivity Commission, in providing its analysis of paid parental leave, said:

Given the desire to link paid parental leave to work—

which is clearly something Prime Minister Abbott wants to do—

where an employee has reasonable tenure with an employer, the employer would act as an agent for government and pay the statutory leave payment on its behalf. This is the arrangement used in the United Kingdom.

They go on to say:

Structuring payments in this way would strengthen the link between the employer and employee, which should increase retention rates for the business (and lead to higher lifetime employment by women).

They go on to recommend that there be prepayment of this money so that there are not cash flow problems. As I understand it, that is what was duly implemented.

So here we have the Productivity Commission saying that it is important to create this linkage between the employer and the employee on paid parental leave. We have got the Prime Minister going into overdrive trying to justify what could only be, in the current climate, considered to be overly generous arrangements for a certain segment of the community, saying these are workplace entitlements; these are completely utterly different from any of the entitlements that are paid by government. Yet we had the member for Mitchell and the member for Corangamite before that come in here and say 'these benefits should be considered in the same light as every other social benefit that is paid out by the government'. So it is really important for us to stand up in the debate on this piece of legislation and say we are not going to support it because it absolutely underpins the hypocrisy of the Prime Minister in this whole scheme.

Before their last election, Labor committed to providing some relief for small businesses, and there was an acknowledgment that when you are dealing with very small businesses—20 employees or fewer—they are unlikely to have HR staff and, therefore, we were prepared to look at an exemption in relation to those small businesses. But there was not this general opt-out; in a scheme that has now been sold to the public as something completely different from all other welfare payments, and that has been used, as I said, to justify the excessive nature of this scheme.

I want to talk about many of the things that the member for Hotham has raised. As someone who has had children and known what the difficulty is for young mothers returning to the workforce, I want to highlight the complete implausibility of even the Prime Minister's stated intention for this overly generous paid parental leave that is quite clearly being funded in part from a tightening and a holding back on childcare payments.

I know from my own experience and I know from dealing with the young women in my electorate who want to return to work that the biggest problem is the availability of child care, and second to that is the cost of child care. Even the availability is a massive problem in Perth. Trying to find somewhere to provide care, and decent quality care in particular, particularly for children under two-years-old, is the greatest impediment for women returning to the workforce.

The Productivity Commission had some really interesting things to say about the proposal for full replacement wages which is effectively what we are getting here:

Payment at a flat rate would mean that the labour supply effects would be greatest for lower income, less skilled women precisely those who are most responsive to wage subsidies and who are least likely to have privately negotiated paid parental leave. Full replacement wages for highly educated, well paid women would be very costly for taxpayers and, given their high level of attachment to the labour force and a high level of private provision of paid parental leave, would have few incremental labour supply benefits.

So any rational analysis of the government's scheme for replacement wages, as opposed to the payment at a flat rate, tells you that this is not good value for money. If your aim is to try to get women back into the workforce, this is not how you do it. They point out that 'women on higher incomes are very likely to have a high level of attachment to the labour force' and there will be 'few incremental benefits to labour supply' by directing the replacement wages policy.

Can you imagine if we were putting $5 billion a year into child care? Imagine how that would revolutionise the participation in the workforce of women with young children. I put it to you that even if we were adding $1 billion a year to child care we would see a marked increment in the number of women that would be returning to work and the amount of hours that were spent by those women who have returned to work.

Common sense—combined with one's knowledge of the challenges to young parents, particularly women, wanting to return to work after they have had a child—will tell you that the additional money should not be put into providing more money to wealthy women to stay at home. Those women, in all likelihood, will be returning to work, because of their pay levels and their education levels and because of what they can expect when they return to work. Every economic bone, every common sense bone, every equitable bone, in one's body should tell you that this vast investment, this vast increment of money, that is going into this replacement wages policy of paid parental leave is going down the wrong path. A very considerable proportion of this money should be put into beefing up the availability of child care.

But in this budget we get the opposite. We get a significant scaling back of childcare benefits. We see the childcare benefit threshold frozen; we see the childcare rebate cap frozen. One of the appalling things we see is the universal access to preschool—almost $500 million per year—discounted. This is where we get kids going to kindergarten for four-year-olds, and the Commonwealth assistance to that being cut. This is an absolutely retrograde step, not just for child care and women's participation. The outcomes that we are getting in performance at school as a result of introducing universal access to kindergarten has been huge. This is a cut not only to child care; it is also a dreadful cut to our education standards. We see the Jobs, Education and Training Child Care Fee Assistance scheme cut back while, at the same time, the Prime Minister is saying that he is going to cut back on family tax benefit B because no-one should be sitting at home once their child is six and expecting the taxpayers to support it. But where are you going to put the child when outside school hours childcare places have been cut? If you are wanting to return to work and you have a six-year-old child, during school holidays and after school hours, you are going to require out-of-school care. We have seen $450 million cut out of the after-school-care budget.

All of these positions that have been embraced are completely and utterly contradictory. They say they want to cut out the 'age of entitlement'. They say that people should be going back to the workforce once their kids turn six, but they are cutting the availability of child care for that. This is at the same time as they are embracing a replacement wage policy for paid parental leave that, on any economic analysis, is shown to have very, very few incremental labour supply side benefits.

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The fact that Labor's position on this bill, the Paid Parental Leave Scheme Amendment Bill 2014, is so indefensible is highlighted by the fact that the member for Perth spoke about every single related topic without actually dealing with any of the substantial aspects of this legislation. Let me bring the debate back to the Paid Parental Leave Scheme Amendment Bill, because for the last 15 minutes we have had a frolic on a number of other topics.

The bill before us today presents yet another measure from the coalition to reduce the red tape on business. I must say that the member for Perth, to her credit, mentioned small business once. So you are one up on the member for Hotham—you mentioned it once. This is a small business measure. I know members opposite do not know much about small business. Not many of you have ever run or had much to do with small business, but this bill is about small businesses.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Your actions do not represent it today, do they? We have a situation here where the bill in front of us seeks to replace $44 million of cost burdens on small business with $7 million from the government—and members opposite, in an unconscionable way, are blocking that. This is one series in a series of steps that the government is taking to slash cumbersome and unnecessary regulations. It also reaffirms the government's commitment to support women to have a child and to return to work—a commitment underlined by our Paid Parental Leave Scheme.

The history of the bill before us today also demonstrates the complete and utter lack of understanding of business possessed by those on the opposite side of the House, as I have said. When I was reading about this bill I was pretty baffled to read about Labor's years of obstruction to what seems like a very straightforward measure. To the credit of the now Minister for Small Business, the Hon. Bruce Billson, the genesis of this bill was a private member's motion back in 2011, and it should have been put to bed then. If we cannot get bipartisan support on something as basic and as straightforward as this, we have problems. It was voted down then and again in 2012. Now in the Senate we see Labor and the Greens locking arms together as usual seeking to block it and they want to introduce a confusing and water down version of the amendment. I will come back to this in a moment.

The bill here today—irrespective of the frolic that the member for Perth went on—simply seeks to relieve business of the burden of having to act as the pay clerk for the Paid Parental Leave Scheme introduced by the former Labor government. As I have said, it is not a radical amendment being proposed. It will save businesses $44 million a year and the not-for-profit sector $4 million a year. I want to echo the comments of the member for Mitchell when he said that those compliance burdens that would be lifted if this legislation is passed are likely to be reinvested by small businesses. That means upgrades to capital. That means more hours for casual workers. These are important things.

The Labor Party think that you can just put on another burden—a bit like a camel struggling under the weight of a pack: 'Just a bit more; it can take it.' That is what is weighing down small business—that mentality that you can keep loading small businesses with compliance burdens. In small businesses and family owned businesses, that is difficult. Having grown up in a small business family, I know that every time there is an additional government obligation—an additional form to fill out, an additional requirement—it is the owners who have to do that work. Often they cannot afford to employ additional people to do that, so generally it means that very late at night they are the ones doing that paperwork. We want to make sure that small businesses are relieved of an unnecessary burden in this case.

I have spoken about the $44 million saving at a national level, but in my home state of Victoria it will save approximately $11½ million a year. Businesses of all sizes as well as organisations in the not-for-profit sector will be freed up to focus on what they do best—creating wealth and employment. Businesses have much more important tasks to undertake with their resources rather than acting as a pay clerk for the Paid Parental Leave Scheme. Business has been telling us this for five years. Employer groups first raised their concerns and their objections to the mandatory employer under the PPL scheme during public consultations back in 2009, before the scheme was even implemented. Unsurprisingly, the former Labor government ignored those representations. We have also heard from employers through the legislative review of the PPL scheme and through businesses contacting us directly about the burden the pay clerk duties place on the operation of their business.

I would say to members opposite, do not believe us, do not trust us; listen to small businesses. They are crying out for it. Again, just last year, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry conducted a survey of its members on the PPL Scheme. These statistics have been quoted in this debate by some others, but they are overwhelming, so let me quote them again.    In the survey, 84.3 per cent of businesses either agreed or strongly agreed that 'the government should not require employers to be the paymaster for the Paid Parental Leave Scheme'. The additional costs to employers were outlined in the Paid Parental Leave Evaluation Phase 2 Report, with the extra workload the main cause for concern. It said that among the 29 per cent of employers who felt additional costs were involved, 94 per cent, so basically all, said these costs involved them taking on extra work, while 51 per cent said the workload of current staff had been increased by PPL. The median number of staff hours needed to implement PPL was 11 hours. The median cost was $1,783.

Employers have been consistent and strong in their opposition to having to act as pay clerk and we have listened. When it comes to business, every additional cost, every additional piece of regulation that you have to comply with impacts your bottom line.    For the past six years, government in this country has been hindering not helping business, but this is changing.    Today's bill is just one in a suite of measures being introduced to slash red tape in Australia.

On 26 March, we held the parliament's first ever red tape repeal day. More than 10,000 acts and regulations were repealed, removing more than 50,000 pages from the statute books. We are saving more than $700 million in paperwork costs per year. Benefits to for small business include repealing the carbon tax, which will not only remove a $9 billion a year hit on the economy but also save over $85 million a year in monitoring, record keeping and reporting costs; establishing a dedicated small-business hotline at the Fair Work Ombudsman so small businesses can access fast, binding advice on employment terms and conditions; using standard contract terms for government procurements under $200,000 and credit cards for payments under $20,000 so small businesses can be paid sooner; amending the personal property securities regime to reduce the burden on hire firms; and of course, moving the pay clerk burden of administering paid parental leave from small business to the Family Assistance Office, saving employers $48 million a year. We took a clear promise to the 2013 election to remove the pay clerk burden and today we are honouring that promise. That is why we will not pass Labor's amendment to this bill in the Senate.

In March, having twice voted down this amendment, Labor and their partners the Greens further demonstrated their lack of appreciation for the business environment by introducing a watered-down amendment. Labor is seeking to remove the paymaster role for businesses with fewer than 20 employees but, of course, without any explanation as to how this cut-off would be calculated. There are many hundreds of businesses in my electorate which certainly have more than 20 employees. They are by no way large enterprises. The concept that a business that hires between 20 and 100 employees is somehow so well-resources that they can act as the pay clerk for PPL is just wrong. That is why we believe this is an unacceptable position. This is now what business wants and this is what the Australian people want, as they told us last September.

The government wants to see this election commitment fully implemented and we are asking those opposite not to be mindlessly opportunistic in their opposition but, after years of obstruction, to see reason and support us in this. This is not controversial. This helps small businesses drastically. Again, our amendment to the payroll system—unlike their approach—is not even mandatory. What more flexibility can we give small businesses than we are giving them in this bill? We are giving businesses freedom to choose. We do not pretend to have a better understanding of a business and its resources than the owner. It is quite astounding that members opposite would seek to presume to have that knowledge or insight because we know that the Labor Party ignored small businesses for six years. They do not care about small business but we do on this side.

We are asking employers to decide what is best for their business and for their workers when it comes to administering the PPL Scheme. If an employer has administrative capacity and has found the role to be beneficial to their organisation, they can opt in and continue to act as a pay clerk for the PPL Scheme, if the employee also agrees. Based on the research and on the evidence directly from small businesses that I highlighted earlier, I doubt there would be many employers opting in to continue in that role.

Between 1 July 2011 and 30 June 2013, some 125,000 employees received paid parental leave from their employer. Some employers might continue to administer paid parental leave but it will be their choice. An argument has been put forward that by no longer making it mandatory for employers to administer PPL, somehow employees going on paid parental leave will lose their attachment to the workforce. I find that an absolutely bizarre argument. I am not sure what the evidence would be to back that up. It is an argument that does not pass muster. Furthermore, the administrative costs being placed on businesses, which have clearly been calculated, far outweigh the imagined benefits put forward by Labor of employees feeling more 'connected'. Again, I think the Labor Party are really grasping at straws in a desperate attempt to justify an approach they have taken which is to be mindlessly opportunistic in opposing the legislation.

The Department of Human Services already administers PPL payments for approximately 24 per cent of employees. It makes sense therefore for the department to be responsible for the majority of payments and we will ensure the resources are available to department to do so. On this side of the chamber we want paid parental leave to work for everybody: employers and employees, as well as the government. That is what we are putting forward here in this legislation.

The government, of course, has a more comprehensive plan for paid parental leave in this country, a scheme that will give mothers every opportunity to return to their careers. Our genuine, fully-funded paid parental leave scheme will help keep mothers engaged with the work force like never before. We remain committed to introducing it from 1 July 2015. In the meantime, I would ask members opposite not to obfuscate. Deal with the matters at hand in this legislation. It is an indefensible position, I know, and it might be tempting to try and talk about everything other than what is in this legislation. But stick to the task at hand. The bill we have before us today is a sensible move to alleviate unnecessary red tape from the existing PPL scheme in order to get employers back to business. I commend it to the House.

Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was interesting listening to the previous speaker's very well-prepared speech on the Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2014 and to the contributions of members on the other side, who have mindlessly regurgitated the party line and the PM's slogans. It is interesting that the member speaking previously had to sit down and write out in detail the same words that just about every member on the other side of this parliament has used. He has been concentrating on the contribution that business makes to the current paid parental leave scheme. This actually was not where I was going to start in my contribution to this debate, but I really feel that I need to address that issue right up front.

Early evaluation in 2013 of employers' experiences in implementing the paid parental leave scheme really shows that the words we have just heard from the member opposite are completely fallacious. A survey of employers showed that 54 per cent disagreed with the statement 'organising the payment for paid parental leave scheme has been time consuming'. Twenty-nine per cent of employers agreed that additional costs were involved in implementing the scheme. Of those reporting additional costs, 94 per cent stated that this rose with an extra workload they took on themselves. They took it on themselves; it had nothing to do with implementing a new payroll system.

In terms of staff hours, I was listening earlier to the member for Mitchell, who was regurgitating the same words, and he was talking about 22 hours. Twenty-five per cent of employers reported two hours, 24 per cent said three to five hours and 22 per cent said 15 hours—hardly what we have heard from members on the other side of this parliament. Cost to the organisations implementing the paid parental leave scheme, the employers, has been minimal. That was found when employers were surveyed.

The member speaking previously also said that business was supportive of their scheme and was opposed to the scheme that is currently in place. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry slammed the coalition scheme and called for a greater means test that would considerably improve the scheme's affordability and fairness. The Australian chamber of commerce are saying that this scheme is unaffordable and unfair. Charlotte Hayes, finance and administration manager at the Australian Grand Prix Corporation, said paying six months parental leave to women on salaries of $150,000 was too generous. I note that it has now been reduced to $100,000. Innes Willox of the Australian Industry Group said the current system works well. I repeat that: the current system works well. He said there is no reason for it to change. Peter Anderson, the CEO of ACCI, said it is an excessive paid parental leave scheme. Heather Ridout, the former chief of the Australian Industry Group, said:

On any measure this is bad parental leave policy and it's bad tax policy.

Even amongst the Prime Minister's colleagues there is dissent about this signature paid parental leave policy, which is not popular in the community. Nationals Senator John Williams recently refused to rule out crossing the floor to vote against this legislation. Senator Williams and Senator Cory Bernardi signalled that they may vote against this Rolls Royce scheme. The member for Tangney said:

I do have significant concerns.

He is a very sensible member. I note the concern he raised about the cuts to science in the budget being very worrying. He goes on to say:

I think there are better ways to attack the overall problem: having affordable and easy access to childcare.

I join with the member for Perth in saying that that is one of the issues that is constantly raised in my electorate in relation to women seeking to return to the work force. I listened to the contribution made by the member for Mitchell. On 6 May last year he said:

And the question is, is this good economic policy at this time, and my answer is no.

That very much demonstrates a member saying one thing before the election and another thing after the election.

The legislation that we have before us today is bad legislation. It is important to note that Labor introduced the first ever paid parental leave scheme, in January 2011. It was embraced by women throughout Australia. It has benefited 340,000 families. I think that is exceptional. And there have been an additional 40,000 dads and their partners who have also benefited from the dad and partner's pay. Labor's scheme was designed to benefit all Australian families, particularly those on low and middle-class incomes. Many of those people work in casual and part-time employment.

I know that when the Prime Minister first started touting his Paid Parental Leave scheme he said that he wanted the right kind of women to have babies. I find that offensive. I do not think that determining whether or not a woman is the right type of woman to have a baby has anything to do with the income that that woman earns. I think the right kind of woman to have a baby is a woman who wants a baby, who wants to love her baby, who is prepared to contribute to that child's life throughout and who is totally committed to that child. So I reject wholeheartedly the concept that only women earning $100,000 or more are the right type of women to have babies.

I would also like to add that around 55 per cent of working mothers had absolutely no access to a paid parental leave scheme at all before Labor introduced their scheme. I might also add that women who have higher incomes already tend to have access to quite lucrative paid parental leave schemes. But, before Labor's scheme, 55 per cent of women had absolutely no access to paid parental leave schemes. Today, access to the Paid Parental Leave scheme now stands at 95 per cent of all working women. Is the median income for these women $100,000? No, the median income is $45,000. When you are a woman on $45,000 a year, the decision as to whether or not you can afford to have a child is much harder to make than if you are on $100,000 a year.

By contrast, this scheme, the Prime Minister's rolled gold Paid Parental Leave scheme, will give $50,000 to wealthy women to have babies. I might add to that, just as a little aside, that this $50,000 is going to wealthy women whilst he is attacking pensioners and unemployed people throughout Australia. He is looking at making their lives harder—unbearable—and imposing a GP tax on all Australian families. It is just not good enough. It is not what I understand to be fair. It is not what I understand to be the Australian way. This Prime Minister is about looking after those people who have high incomes at the expense of people who look to governments for support.

This scheme comes at enormous cost: $5.5 billion a year and $21 billion over the forward estimates. To relate that back to the comments I just made, we have a Prime Minister who is about changing the indexation of pensions, which will lead to a cut in the pension for all Australians; making it harder for people with disabilities to get the support they need; and rewarding women who are on $100,000 a year. This legislation really shows how the Abbott government have their priorities all wrong. It is about supporting those people that they believe supported them.

Today the government has moved to change the scheme that was designed by Labor when they were in government. It was a scheme that was working really well. It was a scheme that had the support of people throughout the community. That scheme was designed so that employers maintained their contact with women when they were on paid parental leave. That was a very important component of the scheme. It was to retain that connectedness between that woman and the workplace. This government is seeking to break that connectedness.

Labor consulted widely with employers and employees and recognised the fact that, for companies or employers that employed under 20 employees, it may place a higher burden on them. It was because of that fact that Labor went to the 2013 election with the commitment to change the way that those employees received their paid parental leave. This was to assist and to recognise that small businesses found it a little difficult. Centrelink was going to make payments to those employees while they were on leave. That was a sensible balance, a sensible change to the legislation and a change that was developed in consultation with employers, rather than a thought bubble that the Prime Minister had one day, when he thought he would change from totally opposing the Paid Parental Leave scheme to supporting a rolled-gold model that would, in his words, encourage the right type of women to have children.

There have been a number of reports done in relation to the Paid Parental Leave scheme. The reports indicate that it may be premature to suggest that the benefits of having the employer provide the Paid Parental Leave scheme are outweighed by the costs. This evidence is being supplied by employers. The Paid Parental Leave scheme should be seen as a workplace entitlement rather than welfare. This government is placing the Paid Parental Leave scheme in the basket of welfare. This is not good legislation. This is legislation that has been developed without consultation. I encourage those members on the other side not to just regurgitate the lines that they have been given in their party room and stand here and read speeches but to stand up for women and make the right decisions. (Time expired)

Louise Markus (Macquarie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak on the Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2014. I will first make some comments about the contribution of the member for Shortland. Her comments with regard to the pension are absolutely scurrilous and false. The pension will not be cut. What will alter is how people's pensions increase. People's pensions will continue to increase.

This bill will benefit small business across our nation, with a common-sense approach to a very important sector. The coalition came to the 2013 election with a clear direction to reduce red tape for business. For too long, small business have been shackled by regulation, paperwork and compliance costs. These costs, in both dollars and time, stunt productivity and hinder growth. This bill is another small step in the right direction with regard to reducing red tape. It is a small step, but altogether these bills will make a real-life difference for the day-to-day running of businesses, particularly in the electorate of Macquarie.

This bill takes the 'pay clerk' burden of the Paid Parental Leave scheme away from small business if they so wish—they can opt in if they wish to—and shifts the administration back to the Family Assistance Office. It provides choice for small business. From 1 July 2014, employees will be paid directly by the Department of Human Services, unless the employer opts in to provide parental leave pay to its employees and an employee agrees for their employer to pay them. Removing the mandatory employer role under the Paid Parental Leave scheme will help reduce administration and compliance costs on employers. While this may seem like a simple shift, the difference it will make will be significant. It will save business $44 million a year and the not-for-profit sector $4 million a year.

Earlier this year I was honoured to host the Minster for Small Business, the Hon. Bruce Billson, in the Macquarie electorate. As the minister and I sat and listened to small business operators from the Hawkesbury and the Blue Mountains, the issues became clear: small business owners do not have the time or resources to deal with the excessive regulatory burden that has been placed upon them. They want to be free to run their businesses, run their companies, without the need to employ one extra person just to comply with regulations. There are over 10,000 small businesses in the Macquarie electorate. These small businesses employ local people, produce local goods and are the pillar of our local economy. I want them to continue to see a reduction in the regulatory burden. It is important for them to thrive, with confidence and the capacity to build and grow their businesses. The estimated compliance cost reduction for New South Wales alone would be $14,377,000—over $14 million.

This bill has an interesting history in the chamber, and I would like to comment on it briefly. The Labor government's Paid Parental Leave scheme was given royal assent on 14 July 2010. On 24 February 2011, Labor voted down the member for Dunkley's private member's bill to remove the 'pay clerk' burden from business for the Paid Parental Leave scheme. On 24 May 2012, Labor voted down the coalition's amendment to remove the 'pay clerk' burden from business for the Paid Parental Leave scheme. On 5 March 2014, in the Senate, Labor and the Greens sought to amend the coalition government's amendment to remove the 'pay clerk' burden from business for the Paid Parental Leave scheme, instead limiting it to businesses with fewer than 20 employees, essentially blocking the coalition government's amendment. Finally, on 19 March 2014, as a part of the coalition's commitment to hold a repeal day, Minister Billson introduced a bill to remove the 'pay clerk' burden from business for the Paid Parental Leave scheme.

The inability of Labor to support this notion since its inception shows their complete lack of credibility when it comes to supporting small business or understanding the challenges facing small business. It shows that small business are facing a challenge from the other side of politics. I would like to remind the House that, in the five years from mid-2007, Australia's multifactor productivity declined by nearly three per cent. During this time, Labor introduced more than 975 new or amended pieces of legislation and over 21,000 additional regulations. The Productivity Commission has estimated that regulation compliance costs could amount to as much as four per cent of Australia's GDP. We cannot afford to keep hindering growth and productivity. We are in government to send a clear message that Australia is 'open for business'. We are on track to deliver our commitment of the $1 billion annual target for cutting red and green tape. This bill contributes in some small way towards that.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! It being 1.30 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The debate may be resumed at a later hour.