Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Adelaide proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The failures of the Government's child care package.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Kate Ellis (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is absolutely a matter of public importance that this parliament pauses to discuss the failures in the government's child care reforms. These child care reforms are currently before the parliament. The Prime Minister has called them 'the most significant reform to the early education and care system in 40 years'. The minister responsible has also said, 'These are the most comprehensive set of reforms to child care in a generation.' So it is a pretty strange thing that when you look at the speakers list as to who is lining up to talk about these reforms, there is not a single member of the backbench opposite who will put their name down to talk to these reforms. Yet everybody opposite is lining up to talk about the critically important flaws that there are in these reforms.

If these really were the best child care reforms this parliament had ever seen, of course government backbenchers would be lining up to be associated with them. But they have gone running the other way. There are some very good reasons for that. There is a very good political reason. We have all seen, in some of the trickiest, most disgusting politics to come before this parliament, that this government has linked these child care reforms. They are holding Australian families to ransom, saying, 'The only way that you get any additional assistance with child care is if this parliament signs up to make young unemployed Australians, new mothers and low-income Australian families pay the price for these reforms.' That a disgusting linkage, which, as we know because Senator Sinodinos has told us, the government has only done for their pure political purposes.

For this speech I would like to put the politics aside. Let's not talk about politics; let's talk about the policy flaws which there are in this package. When we just look at the child care reforms, we can see, as we have seen every single time these reforms have been put forward, as we have seen in every single Senate inquiry, that there are serious issues with this policy that this parliament needs to address. It takes a certain sort of skill to spend hundreds of millions of additional dollars to make some of the most vulnerable Australians worse off. But that is exactly what these child care reforms would do. We know that as a result these reforms some of the most low-income, disadvantage, vulnerable Australians—children—would have their hours of early childhood education cut back. We also know that, just a couple of weeks after this parliament came together to talk about the importance of closing the gap, there are very real threats in these reforms to some of the Indigenous services which service the most vulnerable children in this nation in remote Australia. We know that there are very real threats in these proposals to the mobile services which offer the only access to early childhood education that many children in regional Australia have.

It is not just Labor that is putting forward these complaints about the bill; it is, in fact, every single major early childhood stakeholder in this country. It is every single one of the providers that have put forward submissions on this bill. It is every single one of the not-for-profit Australian charities who stand up for vulnerable Australians. It is every single representative of regional children, of Indigenous children, who have pointed out these flaws. But this government, either through laziness or pure incompetence, has once again introduced these reforms to the parliament without fixing it up.

Labor stands here today saying that we want to see our child care system improved. We want to see additional assistance put into the Australian child care system. In fact we want to work with the government to better streamline the system to better deliver relief to Australian families. But we will not do it at the expense of the most vulnerable, disadvantaged or regional children in this nation. We simply will not.

Today I want this parliament not to take my word for the concerns about these child care proposals, but to listen to some of the experts. I would like to quote first of all, when it comes to the threat that these proposals put forward to Indigenous children, the Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care, who have stated:

It is like putting a square peg in a round hole, trying to jam it in and make sure it fits. We know that it is not going to because we are going to have splinters everywhere. What is going to happen to our services? In 2018 they will have to close their doors.

Shame! How dare this government step forward and say that Indigenous children, who have the most to gain from access to early childhood education, should pay the price of these child care reforms. In fact, the government's own review of these budget based funded services found in their own report that only a small number of BBF services are likely to be able to transition. Former Australian of the year, Fiona Stanley, has stated:

It will fail. Every service that I can actually think of in the children's area that is mainstreamed after Aboriginal control fails, and it fails because the services that these Aboriginal-controlled people are providing provide a whole range of other things that are very protective and culturally important for Aboriginal children and their families.

The Deloitte review of Indigenous services found that as a result of the government's reforms 54 per cent of families will face an average fee increase of $4.40 per hour. Forty per cent of families will have their access to early education reduced, but, most importantly, and what this parliament really needs to stop and take note of, is the finding that over two thirds of these Indigenous services will have their funding cut.

This is a government talking about spending over $1 billion of additional taxpayers' money on early childhood education and care services and sending Indigenous, vulnerable, disadvantaged and regional children's access backwards.

We know the mobile services that many regional communities in Australia rely on will be hit hard. In fact, the chair of the National Association of Mobile Services, Anne Bowler, has said:

The funding reform proposal will no doubt ensure the closure of up to 90 per cent of the current BBF mobile children's services across rural and remote communities in Australia.

So it is not just the Indigenous services. It is not just regional services which will close if the government gets its way. The government is also attacking access to early childhood education of many, many vulnerable and disadvantaged children through the cuts to the activity test which it is introducing. This new, complicated activity test, as it stands in the legislation which is before the parliament, will see about 150,000 families worse off.

Let us all be very clear. The research is overwhelming. We know that the most vulnerable Australian children are the very children who have the most to gain from early childhood education. It is unthinkable that this parliament would knowingly halve the access to these vital services that these children have. But that is exactly what they are proposing to do. Every one of the major stakeholders has raised serious concerns about this. The Community Child Care Co-op in New South Wales says: 'The childcare safety net actually cuts the level of support already in place. Children, especially those from low-income families, will bear the brunt of this policy change.' The Australian Childcare Alliance, the biggest representative of private childcare providers across Australia, states:

Families in the lowest income bracket, earning less than $65,710 gross per annum will have their base hours of subsidised access cut from 24 hours per week to just 12 hours. This reduction will have unintended negative consequences for the quality early learning outcomes for some of Australia’s most disadvantaged children.

And of course we also note Mission Australia has said:

Children from disadvantaged families need to have access to two days per week of affordable quality early childhood education and care as a minimum. The 12 hours per week proposed is insufficient.

There are serious flaws in this government bill, and we are standing here today to urge the government to address these flaws. The first thing they need to do is drop the cruel and unfair cuts that are included in the omnibus bill. The second thing they need to do is really prioritise.

Australian mums and dads, and Australian children, are calling on this parliament to finally act when it comes to fixing our childcare system. We have seen an entire term of parliament come and go without the government doing a single thing to improve the Australian childcare system. All they managed to do in the entire last term of parliament was introduce their dud nanny pilot scheme and then, of course, cut it because they saw that it just did not work. Now is the time that the parliament can come together and make real reforms. Labor will back the government's childcare proposals, but they need to fix these serious flaws. They need to protect Indigenous Australian children, they need to protect our regional services and they cannot cut the access of the most vulnerable Australian children.

I have a challenge for those opposite today who are going to contribute to this debate: how about, rather than standing up and running your key lines and your political attacks, trying to defend what it is you are doing to Indigenous, regional and low-income Australian children? I bet you that you cannot do it. If one of you can stand for 10 minutes and talk about why these children should pay the price, we would be very interested in hearing it. But Labor will continue to stand up and fight for those who need it the most.

Karen Andrews (McPherson, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Vocational Education and Skills) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am delighted to be the adult in the room while we talk about childcare reforms. I know that I will shortly be joined by my colleagues here, as we talk about the reforms that the Turnbull government is making to child care—the most comprehensive reforms to child care. I will just start by giving a very brief summary of some of these reforms, and then I want to put these reforms into some context.

Firstly, our reforms will benefit around one million families. So one million families will receive a benefit from the reforms that are being introduced by the Turnbull government. The lowest income Australian families will see their subsidy rate increase from 76 per cent to 85 per cent. For those families with an income of $185,710 or less, the rebate cap of $7½ thousand will be abolished. This means that those families will not face the financial cliff that generally occurs around March or April of each year when that rebate cuts out and they are forced to fund the deficit themselves. That is a benefit to those families.

We want to support women. We want to support families as they balance their family needs. We all understand on this side of the House that child care is a very important issue. We want to debate it in a sensible and a rational manner, and that is what we are going to proceed to do today. Let us start by putting some context around this entire debate. Central to the debate is workforce participation, and particularly female workforce participation. I have some stats that I am keen to put on the record because they are actually critical to the debate that we are having today. The debate centres around workforce participation, because that is one of the primary reasons we need to look at providing support for child care. I have in front of me some ABS statistics for January 2017. Let me start with that figure. Female workforce participation sits nationally at 58.5 per cent, which is somewhat less than the male participation rate. When you start to look at the series average, which is over a period of 220 months, female workforce participation averages to a lower rate of 57.3 per cent. In the late 1970s female workforce participation was sitting at around 43 per cent. In 2017, some 40 years later, the January 2017 figure of around 58 per cent is only 15 per cent higher than the late 1970s result. So over a 40-year period there has only been around a 15 per cent increase in female workforce participation. Interestingly, there are some signs that there has been an increase in female participation for those aged 45 years and older. This is an interesting fact in itself, which, if I have time, I will come back and talk to.

The important thing for us to recognise in this debate is that one of the fundamental things that we have to do is increase female workforce participation. The questions we need to ask really go to why do we have an issue with female participation? Why don't more women take part in the workforce? Why are there not more women out there looking for work? Child care is clearly a part of that issue, and there are two parts to that: there is the quality of the child care that is available and there is the cost. The coalition government is dealing with both of those issues, and has done so in many ways since its election to government in 2013, and subsequent to that. We are addressing both of those, but the announcement a little while ago by the minister for education, Senator Birmingham, specifically deals with the cost issue, which is one of the focus points for today's debate.

So we are targeting the areas that are most important to women with child care—the quality and the cost of child care. We do that because we know that more women want to rejoin the workforce and they want to do that for a number of reasons. One is that they want to support the family budget so what they can earn will contribute, will ensure that they are able to provide properly for their family. They also want to utilise the skills they have achieved, what they have gained prior to beginning their families. They are just two very pressing reasons that women want to rejoin the workforce.

You have then got the balance to that, which is: why does business need more women in the workforce? Interestingly, particularly in my former role as the Assistant Minister for Science, I spoke to many companies who were very keen to increase female participation in the traditional male dominated fields, those who had a STEM background. I did put to them: why do you want to increase the number of women that you have, for example, in engineering jobs and the other male dominated fields as well? Their answer was actually quite simple. It was because if they were to harness the skills that were available potentially in the market, they could not exclude 50 per cent of that market so they had to increase their female participation in the workforce to make sure that they were able to attract and retain the key skills that they needed into the future. So we know that business has a need to attract more women.

I go back to saying: what are the issues that stop women from entering the workforce or re-entering the workforce or increasing their working hours? Child care is clearly a part of it. I have dealt with the cost issue. I would like to touch on some of the quality issues. The women that I speak to, the women who are accessing child care now or who wish to access child care because it is currently unaffordable for them now, say to me that they do not just want a babysitting service. They do not just want some where to pop their children in to be looked after while they go to work. They actually want to take their children to a centre that provides an early learning opportunity for their children.

We recognise on this side of the House that 80 per cent of a child's development takes place in their first three years of life so we are very conscious of making sure that the childcare services that we are supporting, that we know that the women in the families of Australia actually need, are more aligned to early learning rather than simply babysitting services. We also know that child care, early learning is part of lifelong learning and we have again put our money where our mouth is on this particular issue. We have put money into early learning programs such as the Let's Count program, such as the Little Scientists program. We are targeting the kindergarten years to make sure that our young kids, our future generations, the ones that are going to be out there earning money, supporting themselves, supporting their families into their old age are part of the education highway. That starts in the early childhood years and continues through schools and, in my area, goes through vocational education and potentially onto higher education. It is so important that it we provide our young people with the skills that they need, and let's start at the early learning centres. That is an excellent entry point.

I have indicated to you very clearly today the work that the Turnbull coalition government has been doing in the area of child care. Whilst we have been working, I would say that those opposite, at best, have been thinking about what they need to do. But it is a little bit hard to follow what their plan is. I do have a couple of quotes. I noticed that the member for Adelaide had a couple of quotes so I might just quote back some of the things that she may well be aware of. Back in June of last year, Labor's election policy said:

If elected, a Shorten Labor Government will provide a boost in assistance to families from 1 January 2017 – increasing the Child Care Benefit by 15 per cent and lifting the Child Care Rebate cap from $7,500 to $10,000 per child per year.

They said that even though in 2008 the Productivity Commission said 'following Labor's increase in the rate of the child care rebate in July 2008 from 30 to 50 per cent of a family's out-of-pocket expenses, the average annual increase in long day care fees accelerated,' so Labor has clearly been out there increasing costs.

On this side of the House, does our package support families? Yes, it does. Does it support women? Yes, it does. Does it increase female workforce participation? Yes, it does. Is it fair? Yes. And what is standing in the way? It would be Labor.

Cathy McGowan (Indi, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to stand here in support of this matter of great public importance. I would like to value-add to the comments of the member for Adelaide. I am not going to go over some of the things she talked about. But in bringing my comments to the House, I want to be a little bit more philosophical. If I could begin by addressing the comments of the member for McPherson to say, Assistant Minister, I so agree with you about how important it is to have access to child care if you are going to get access to work. You were right; cost is a matter, quality is a matter but most importantly availability matters. If you do not have available child care, no amount of cost or quality is going to make it work.

Today I would like to address my comments to the process of public policy. As I said, I do not want to go over what the member for Adelaide has said because I think that stands. But for me, process of good policy involves three levels. We have got have really good process at the beginning, at the up-front in the design and how it works. We have got have really good implementation processes and we have got to have really effective processes to show us that our outcomes are being reached, that the policy is actually doing what you want it to do. In that design process, it is really important to have good engagement and consultation. In the delivery mechanism, it is really important that you have good consultation and engagement. In the review and in checking out how it is going against your outcomes, you have got have good engagement and consultation.

I have a special interest in this particular topic because, for a number of years, I was national president and I am now a lifetime member of Australian Women in Agriculture. While child care is not necessarily a women's issue, I have to say that, in rural and regional Australia, we pick up most of the work. So for a number of years before I was in this wonderful place, I took that role of lobbying, particularly for child care, very seriously. And as part of the Australian Women in Agriculture, through the organisation NAMS and through SNAICC I have been part of working with government on a whole lot of issues to make sure that consultation and engagement around policy worked. In this particular instance, really, the government is letting us all down. But some of those consultation mechanisms that we had, such as the national Regional Women's Advisory Council and the regional women's access council, have all been done away with. So the government does not even have access now to the wisdom of us rural women. Consequently, we get the problem that has been outlined by the member for Adelaide. We have a service delivery model that is not going to engage with rural and regional Australia—and, as the member for Adelaide pointed out, particularly for Aboriginal women, but it is for all of us rural and regional women.

The sad thing is, exactly as the member for McPherson said, that child care is a basic fundamental of productivity gains, and in agriculture we estimate that in excess of $14 billion is contributed by women to agriculture. Ensuring access to quality child care could be the one single thing we do that would increase productivity in Australia, almost beyond any other measure. I say to members of the government: with access to quality child care we could increase productivity, just as the member for McPherson said, by enabling women to really reach their potential in the agricultural businesses. But it is not going to happen. Why? It is because, exactly as the member for Adelaide said, the changes to the model are going to say that rural and regional Australia needs to transition. Now, transition is fine, but in my communities, the smaller ones, there is nothing to transition to. There is no service. So a basic philosophical problem with the design of this program is that, if you do not have a service, if you do not have access, there is nothing to transition to. No amount of subsidy is going to make a difference if you do not have a service. I know that there were problems with the BBF Program, and they needed to be resolved, but they did not need to be done away with.

In closing, I would really like to say that I appreciate the work of the government and the minister in particular, offering some of his Public Service staff to come to Indi and commit to doing the work, post the legislation going through, that will enable us to have a long-term, sustainable, equitable childcare service for rural and regional Australia. I will hold him to that promise.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is great to rise and talk on this MPI today. I have never seen as many paternalists in the one place as I see on the other side of this chamber today in the Labor Party. I am trying hard to understand how they justify the merits of taking such an overtly oppressive position on reform which supports choice and a better life for families. This 'hold'em back, keep'em down' approach that they cling to is concerning, to say the very least. We heard from the member for Adelaide, the shadow minister for early childhood education and development, who was the minister in this space for many years under the previous government. Well, you had your turn, and you failed. You failed. Under your term, childcare costs went through the roof.

Ms Kate Ellis interjecting—

If she wants to bring her quotes in here, then the shadow minister opposite should quote mothers in my electorate who go to work, earn $60,000 a year and pay $15,000 a year in childcare costs—$300 a week for one child.

Ms Kate Ellis interjecting—

You have no idea, and under your term as minister you failed. You failed big time. So, if you want to quote someone, quote them.

On hours cut back for some children—well, that is true. There may be some mothers who do not work full-time in the workforce. Obviously, they are parents and they work. Some of their children's hours of child care might be reduced, and I will come back to that in a moment.

I would also say to the member for McPherson that she is absolutely right when she says the coalition's childcare reform package supports families. Yes, it does. It supports women. Yes, it does. It increases female workforce participation. Yes, it does. It was good to hear from the member for Indi, opposite, who spoke about regional families and women. I know that she cares very much about her community and obviously wants to get the minister out there to address some issues.

I have enormous respect for families who consciously choose for one parent to stay at home and care for their children. I also support parents who both need to go to work. I understand the frustrations of parents who put in a full day's work and knock off, pay cheque in hand, and pass that cheque to the childcare centre in return for their child. We want families to choose their child care around their work, rather than limit their work hours to suit their child care.

We must take every opportunity to incentivise people who want to work. Our demographics are such that maximum workforce participation is paramount. At the moment, we have four or five people of working age for every person over 65. In the not-too-distant future, that ratio will halve to two or three people of working age for every Australian aged 65 or over. Our demographics present significant known challenges for our nation. The time to act is now, Member for Adelaide, and it is a battle that we need to fight on all fronts—from tax cuts for business to stimulate growth, investment, and employment opportunities, and a health system that is not only effective but also sustainable, to utilities that are not only reliable but that Australians can afford. Those opposite have no idea when it comes to business and how we pay for all these reforms that we make.

It is estimated that these reforms will encourage more than 230,000 families to increase their involvement in paid employment. Can I just read that again for those opposite: it is estimated that these reforms will encourage more than 230,000 families to increase their involvement in paid employment. As we all know, the larger the workforce, the more capacity we as a nation have to invest in those things that make Australia great—our healthcare, our public schooling, our age based pension, our strong Defence Force, our Australian Federal Police. All of these things, we can do.

In terms of sustainable solutions, these childcare reforms are an absolute no-brainer. The package will deliver the highest rate of subsidy to those who most need it and benefit almost one million families—another point the member for Adelaide forgot to mention. The reforms offer support to families who most depend upon child care in order to work, or to work more.

When access to child care is so expensive that it is beyond the reach of working parents, when it is cheaper to stay home and take a welfare cheque than it is to go to work, then it is time for reform. What we need is a system that supports choice. As a parliament we have an opportunity to support working families— (Time expired)

Rebekha Sharkie (Mayo, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Child care is an important service in our society. While traditionally viewed as a mechanism to help parents re-enter the workforce, it has evolved to meet the early education needs of children. We know that those early years are crucial in a child's educational development and, by extension, crucial to Australia's future. This is why reform of the sector is so critical.

While I and my NXT colleagues have spoken about the importance of these reforms and the benefits they will bring to thousands of Australian families, I think it is clear that there are still commonsense changes that need to be made to ensure that all families are supported. So, like the shadow minister the member for Adelaide, I have concerns about where the budget-based funded childcare services will fit under the new package. These include Indigenous services and remote services, which differ in practice from traditional childcare models, as well as mobile childcare services, which the member for Indi mentioned. They are particularly valuable in regional areas. For many remote Indigenous communities, budget-based childcare services operate in a different manner to other childcare services due to the fact that they cater directly to the community's needs. Many of these centres run youth programs for children, and, while they do not fit perfectly into the childcare funding model, the positive impact on their community is significant.

As the member for lndi mentioned, there is also concern about mobile childcare services to ensure that children and families in disadvantaged regional communities have access to high-quality children's services. These services are invaluable for those living outside of the cities for whom the closest permanent childcare centre may be hours away. I will be seeking assurances from the government that these services will continue to be funded under any new scheme. I will not allow regional Australia to once again be ignored when it comes to making policy decisions.

I want to briefly talk about in-home care and the fact that it appears to have been ignored in this new package. In-home care services support a very small part of our population; they are targeted towards rural areas where no other service is available and to families with children or parents who suffer from disabilities and/or terminal illnesses. The services can also assist shift workers whose hours preclude them from using regular childcare services. For all the good these reforms will do, we cannot allow for some of our in-need families to be ignored and miss out. I call upon the government to address this issue as a matter of priority.

But perhaps the biggest issue for reform is the government's handling of them. It is unfortunate, and in fact it is quite devastating, that we are still talking about the government's childcare bill, almost three years after the reforms were announced. Trying to ram through the reforms as part of the omnibus savings legislation is simply poor policy and it is bullying policy—let's be honest about it. I believe that every bill should be negotiated on its merits. Once again I encourage the government to show some leadership and allow this bill to be debated on its own and promptly. These measures were introduced in 2014 and three years later we still have no reform. The children who were crawling babies on budget night in 2014 are unlikely to ever see the benefits of this long-promised package. They are likely to be in primary school by the time it is enacted. Their families have waited in vain for four long years. Its implementation has now been pushed back to July 2018.

Tying child care to family tax payments is a furphy. Let's be clear, the savings for this have already been identified within the childcare-spending envelope. The government already has secured $950 million in savings from its reforms to crack down on child swapping—and good for them for sorting out the rorting. This week it has announced a further $250 million in savings by cleaning up family day-care rorting. These two measures alone account for almost all of the required spend on this new reform package. So why do we need to continue to attack the family budget and pit family against family for something that has already been paid for?

Let's be honest: if the government is interested in prioritising and increasing workforce participation for parents, these reforms would have been presented to the parliament in 2014 and 2015 and they would have been brought on for debate and passed in 2016. Implementation would not have been pushed back a further year. And so once again I urge the government to work with the parliament to secure these reforms that are so vitally needed across Australia.

Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say that I was almost emotionally touched by the way the member for Adelaide started her address today in this MPI in stating how much she wants to put politics aside and work together with the government. Then, of course, she proceeds by tearing into a negative script against the government. She no doubt is following her fearless leader who seems to do the same—says one thing and delivers another. It is not unlike her performance as minister in this area, where she failed to perform particularly in areas of compliance and fairness and now, of course, claims the opposite.

I am delighted to talk on this topic today because there are three big winners with the coalition's childcare package—families, women and children. As one of my colleagues mentioned, this would impact on almost one million families across the country in allowing them to better balance their responsibilities that come with parenthood and work. When it comes to women in particular, we need to increase the participation rate for women in this country. This package will see 230,000 families in a position to get back into the workforce or to do more work or to increase their level of engagement with the workforce. Those people in those families will be predominantly women.

Children are the third demographic. Here we have a situation where the coalition is already cleaning up this space by getting rid of the shonky providers and the dodgy childcare service providers. I am a dad and, if a child of mine were needing child care, I would prefer them not to be in dodgy care. This package therefore is good for families and is therefore good for women and is therefore good for children. Three big winners!

In particular, the member for Adelaide mentioned the importance of the people who are most vulnerable, and, indeed, this is key. It is why you see cleverly formulated in this package care for the most vulnerable families. It is why you see families who have an income of $65,000 or less a year actually seeing an increase in their subsidy rate, from 73 per cent to 85 per cent. For the members opposite, 85 per cent is actually higher than 73 per cent, which means that, for every dollar a low-income family pays into child care, they get more subsidy back. What that means in the real world is: that is actually good and, therefore, it is best for the families who are most vulnerable.

Let me move on to finish my address here today with an explanation of why it is also just good governance. It is good governance on a few counts. Firstly, it is good governance in the area of the activity test—another area of criticism from the member for Adelaide. What we have in this package is an opportunity for increased hours of care for the families who are ready to use their own hours to engage in more work, training, study or volunteering. Here we have an opportunity again to get people re-engaged with the real economy. Secondly, we have compliance. Over the last year of the Labor government, do you know how many compliance tests they did? They did about 500. In the last financial year of the coalition, do you know how many were done? Over 3,000. With better compliance and new IT systems coming through, you have less cost to the taxpayer, which means, in summary, that this is good. This is good for families, this is good for women, this is good for children. It is better governance, better compliance and, ultimately, better for the Australian taxpayer.

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The social services legislation, the omnibus package of savings and childcare reform that we are debating, really exemplifies just how nasty this government is.

Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Minister for Urban Infrastructure) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You hate the idea of savings, don't you?

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You know what? I will take the interjection. It is not that I hate the idea of savings, but let's just look at where those savings are coming from. The government said, 'What we're going to do is pay for a new childcare package and we're going to—

Mr Fletcher interjecting—

Honourable members interjecting—

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The minister at the table will remain silent. The member for Burt has the call.

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the minister for allowing me to make my point with even more force. The problem with this package is that, in order to pay for it—in fact, to more than pay for it—they are making cuts to the people who can least afford it in our society.

Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That's not true.

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is absolutely true and it is very, very mean. It is unfair. It is just plain nasty. Of all the areas in the budget you could have picked on to get the money to pay for this reform. I will admit, there are parts of this reform that are quite positive, but there are a lot of bits that are very negative. To the positive parts, if you were going to find parts of the budget to pay for this, maybe picking on the people who can least afford it—picking on pensioners, people who are trying to find work, single parents, those who are the recipients of family tax benefit—is definitely not the best way to go about it. It is just plain nasty and it demonstrates how out of touch the government are. These childcare changes are going to end up leaving one in three children worse off. This is the same flawed package that the government have tried to introduce three times. They just will not learn.

In addition to that, the activity test will see 150,000 families left worse off. This slashes the subsidies for about half of the families. In addition, if a child's parent works casually or part-time, the likelihood of being able to access stable, subsidised early education is completely compromised, which defeats the whole purpose of trying to improve the childcare rebate and subsidy system. At its core, why we fundamentally think it is a good idea to improve childcare rebates and accessibility to child care, is that this is about equality. It is not just about making sure that our kids get the best start in life, which is absolutely fundamental; it is also about making sure that those in our society who have the predominant responsibility for looking after our children—which, let's be frank about it, is mothers; there are definitely dads out there who do this, but it is predominantly mothers—are not left disadvantaged by not being able to return to the workforce to pursue their careers, and we are able to make sure that we narrow the gender pay gap. The legislation that the government is proposing is not going to end up fixing that. In fact, it may end up making it worse because of the other cuts that it will apply through the welfare system. That is the travesty of this legislation, but it actually gets worse.

When we look at how this legislation affects those who are the most disadvantaged in our society, we have a situation where the government are scrapping the budget base funding for Indigenous early education providers and mobile services in the regions and remote Australia. Early education to around 20,000 children will be put at risk. The government has not been able to guarantee these services. So, for the children who live in some of the most impoverished situations in Australia, those who need the most assistance, the government is going to actively make their situation worse. Again, that demonstrates how nasty this legislation is. This comes on top of the government's decision to cut 38 Indigenous child and family centres. Of course, these unfair measures are on top of the cuts to family tax benefit, cuts to paid parental leave, cuts to the energy supplement for pensioners and cuts to young people and to jobseekers. It is basically indiscriminate cutting across the board to everyone who receives some sort of benefit in this country because they have found themselves unemployed or under-remunerated and need to be assisted. Those are the people that the government has decided to pick on.

I said before that this is a nasty government and this legislation demonstrates it. It is also a love-hate government. This legislation was brought forward on, of all days, Valentine's Day, but all it served to show was that the government hates Australians who find themselves in a situation of needing our help the most. All it shows is that they love big business— (Time expired)

Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a pretty passionate issue for many of us, especially mums and dads who are looking for child care. But I often wonder how we look at balancing everything, whether it be policy direction or how to fund certain programs. On the one hand, we have a policy to make sure that every child in Australia gets 15 hours per week of early childhood education. It has been something that I have been barracking for for four years—

Ms Kate Ellis interjecting—

No, it actually was introduced by Julia Gillard, and we are trying to continue it—to go on.

Ms Kate Ellis interjecting—

Okay—preschool education; I stand corrected.

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The shadow minister has had her turn.

Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This was an expenditure that is absolutely seen as an investment that each of us in this House, no matter the descriptor, believe is a good thing. It has to be affordable. It has to be effective. And the childcare changes that we are bringing into place actually allow it to happen.

I have spoken to many parents and, especially, kindergarten teachers about the absolute need for this activity—for introducing young children to formal education. This is the place where they learn to hold a pencil properly, to sit quietly, to take instructions, to work in small groups and to play productively. For some of the children in my region of Gilmore, this is their very first chance to be part of such an activity. I have been a champion of this aspect of the package for more than three years.

This investment comes with a pretty high price tag. The government's childcare package strikes the right balance. There is targeted childcare support for hardworking families who depend on it, a generous safety net to protect those most vulnerable in our community and ongoing support for high-quality early learning. And that is boosted through $840 million a year of federal support. Where does that money come from?

On this side of the House, we know that money does not grow on trees—even if we are standing in the fairy garden at the local preschool. It seems to me that families with an annual income greater than $185,000 per year will be able to work with the new $10,000-a-year cap for their child care. It also seems to me that most families in Gilmore earn nowhere near that amount. So an 85 per cent subsidy for child care which is uncapped is a huge improvement for them. We have coupled this with a benchmark set for each hour of childcare fees so that unscrupulous centres do not just say, 'Well, the government's going to subsidise it, so I might as well jack the price up a bit,' which, in reality, means that Mr and Mrs Taxpayer are picking up the tab. In most people's view, this is not fair—it is not fair at all. There are many in my community who grew up with no child care for their children: nothing for them—

Ms Husar interjecting—

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Lindsay will stop the sound effects.

Ann Sudmalis (Gilmore, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

and nothing for their kids, and they did it while having a whole extra load of work. We will be asking that the childcare subsidy is only paid if the parent is working, training, studying or volunteering. Our families are desperate for good-quality, affordable child care and for hours that suit.

I would like to visit the problem as stated earlier regarding our Indigenous child care. Some of our centres have been charging a full day for a child who is only in attendance for four hours, then coming to me and saying it is not enough. Well, I agree; spread those hours over the week. Then they say that they do not meet the requirement. But they are teaching those young Indigenous mums parenting skills and literacy; they are making sure the cultural heritage goes through with their children. Not once have they realised that that is training—that that enables those young mums to still get that childcare payment. The operating business model needs to be looked at. They need to make sure they understand exactly what they are doing, talk to the TAFE and get a registered training organisation in association with them, so that these beautiful Indigenous mums will qualify for the full subsidy and keep the facilities open.

This government is truly dedicated to promoting early education, helping with Indigenous childcare centres, helping our single mums get back to work and helping our families who really have not a scrap's worth of education and are trying to better themselves. We are determined that there are opportunities to make a difference in our communities, and this is the way to do it: have well-capped childcare fees; set a benchmark so that the childcare facilities do not keep raising the fees; encourage our Indigenous facilities to say, 'You know what? We're doing a great job. We're training these mums. We've got parenting skills. We've got mums-and-bubs skills. We are looking at cultural diversity.' We can do this. But we need to work together. Both sides of this House need to realise that money does not grow on the fairy tree. We have to balance this out and be reasonable.

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do welcome the opportunity to provide the member for Gilmore with some clarification around the 15-hour access-to-preschool program that she got quite confused, which is not part of this bill but which she just gave us a lovely five-minute diatribe on. Those 15 hours that she was talking about, the government has not actually even recommitted to, and it expires at the end of this year. So anyway, that is a great opportunity for me to take. And it is also great to follow the member for Fairfax, who proved yesterday that he was out of touch and today again has backed that up.

Being in government is about making choices. You get to choose to support people, you get to choose to be responsible and you get to choose that everybody gets a fair go.

There could be no more stark difference between Labor and Liberal than our approach to child care. To the Liberals, child care is an expendable extra and a place where this cruel, out-of-touch government can cut money and slash services to support their $50 billion gift to big business.

We are living at a time when educational attainment rates are placing us at the back of the pack, where education rankings are declining, and where educational shifts for the jobs of the future are occurring. We are also living at a time when outcomes for Indigenous children, unacceptably, do not meet the high standards we set for ourselves, as outlined in the Closing the Gap report handed down in this place just a few weeks ago. And the member for Fairfax totally missed that point in his five-minute diatribe.

So why, then, with all of that evidence and fact based information, would this government choose—they made a choice—to strip away access to child care from the children who will benefit most from access to early learning? Let us see child care for what it is. It is early education. It is an opportunity for young children to engage in learning in their formative years, to be surrounded by age-matched peers learning important social skills, stimulated by trained and skilled professional educators, and nurtured, in the absence of their parents, by those same educators, whose job extends far wider than wiping a snotty nose and simply keeping a child alive—which, I might add, is an indirect quote from someone without a clue on the value of early education: the relic that is Senator Leyonhjelm.

I personally can speak extensively as a single mother on the benefits of early education—and I hear someone slagging off over on the other side. One of my children has special needs. The time my children spent in child care was of profound benefit to them in their early years. I will take the case of my son. He was diagnosed with a raft of issues at 18 months of age. In his case, the early childhood setting provided an additional support teacher for him. He learnt so very much through the love and the support of all of his teachers, who imparted patience and their wisdom to him.

I was not working at the time. I had my hands full, so those two days he spent in child care provided an opportunity for me—as a carer and his Mama—to have much-needed respite, attend to the things that his disability prevented me from doing and have a break from the constant therapies that I provided to support him. It also provided me with some time with my other two children that was not dominated solely by his needs.

I might also say that his childcare workers in those early years formed such a great bond with our family and still remain in contact with us. They follow his progress, celebrate the mighty highs and support me through some of those hard lows. This is not an isolated story or case. I invite all of those opposite to visit a local childcare centre. In fact, there are plenty of stories out there where early education provided through child care is supporting great outcomes for many, many children.

Now, given that this government has failed to introduce a single childcare policy in more than three years—with the exception of that disaster of a Nanny Pilot Program—some might suggest that it would want to get this one right. But, instead, the policy it has introduced will see one in three children worse off—and I did not hear the member for Fairfax mention that once.

More than 20 stakeholder groups who are experts in the industry and not politicians have called on this incompetent Prime Minister to make better choices and fix the flaws in this package. Of particular concern is the cut that this government seeks to pass on to our Indigenous childcare services, which will see 20,000 Indigenous children in early education affected by this cruel and blatantly stupid policy. SNAICC has said:

These changes will diminish our kids' potential to make a smooth transition to school, compounding the likelihood of intergenerational disempowerment and unemployment. Children will fall behind before they have even started school and suffer greater risks of removal into out-of-home care.

And the member for Fairfax can wipe the smile off his ugly face, because that is just totally inappropriate!

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order!

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

What is it that this Prime Minister just does not get?

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Lindsay will withdraw!

Emma Husar (Lindsay, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw. And, on the government's ridiculous activity test, the Social Policy Research Centre, at the University of New South Wales, has said that this 'bill introduces provisions that will increase the complexity and reduce accessibility and affordability for some of the more vulnerable children and families'. Can the Prime Minister just explain why he has so much trouble understanding the experts in this field who are forewarning him that he is harming children through this policy? (Time expired)

Melissa Price (Durack, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I think the member for Fairfax looks pretty good sitting here next to me. Once again I am left to talk after the member for Lindsay and improve the tone of this place, and it is absolutely my pleasure to do so. Another day, another issue from Labor, as we have heard in the last half an hour or so, but we know that, when they were in charge of child care, they made a real meal of it. Before I talk about the improvements to child care, I thought we would just take a little tiny walk down memory lane with those opposite to all those long, dark years until some three years ago. The Productivity Commission—an independent body, as you know, Deputy Speaker—found that Labor's irresponsible increase in the rate of childcare rebate in July 2008 led to an accelerated increase in the average annual long-day-care fees. Let there be no doubt in anyone's mind here: the Australian Labor Party have no credibility on childcare reform, absolutely none.

This government's childcare package, as we know, was announced in the 2015 budget. Under the federal government's package, members on this side of the chamber will make the single largest investment in early learning and child care that this country has ever seen. It is great news for parents, education and child care in my electorate of Durack.

Just so those opposite can comprehend—and I am pleased to see that there are still a few left in the chamber—not only are the federal government ending Labor's waste; we are making a record and unprecedented investment in education at the early age and also supporting the most vulnerable Australians to enable them to get ahead. Mr Deputy Speaker, as you know, the federal government understands that the cost of living has risen significantly in recent years. With our childcare package, we want to help people who are trying to help themselves. It is as simple as that.

There are new job opportunities being created every day in my electorate of Durack, from the Kimberley in the north to the wheatbelt in the south of my electorate, and this package will assist those parents in picking up a couple of extra hours on a day or a couple of extra shifts a week or perhaps in working outside the usual nine to five. Unlike the Labor Party, our package will not just provide parents with a break. I accept that there are some people, as the member for Lindsay described, who have families with special needs. This does provide a break, and I accept that, but I can tell you that there would be many people in this place who know that parents, especially mothers—and I know many of them; many of them are my friends—take advantage of child care in order to give themselves a break. They go to the gym. They get their nails done. I think I am entitled to say this because I have seen it firsthand when my friends are using child care and my child is not able to go to that place, because it is full.

That is not what we are about in this place here. We need to back parents who want to get ahead, accepting that there are some people—as I accept the member for Lindsay did—who have a special need. But, as my colleagues said earlier, this government's package will provide genuine reform for a simpler, more affordable, accessible and flexible childcare system. As someone who has used child care, as I have just said, I know that this is a complicated system that we currently have, and we must make it simpler. It is as simple as that.

With our reforms, those earning the least will be able to enjoy the biggest rebate, up to 85 per cent. And that is the way it ought to be. The most vulnerable should get a helping hand. There is no denying that. As you earn more, of course, the rebate reduces, which is absolutely the way it ought to be. Remember, we are spending taxpayers' dollars here. We need to be careful. We are the government. We must be careful. We must be responsible. Previously, there was little point in earning extra, as the cost of child care would significantly eat into any extra earnings that parents would make. So we are saying now: we are going to back you. You want to work that extra shift? Previously there would have been no point because it would have been eaten up with childcare costs. That exercise would have been futile; now, they will be able to do it.

I just want to make a point. We heard the member for Adelaide and also the member for Lindsay talking about the Indigenous organisations and how they are going to be worse off. I am the member for Durack and a member of this federal government. We will ensure that services supporting our most disadvantaged families—and I have hundreds of them in my electorate, let me tell you—will continue to have access to the same opportunities for additional funding available to other childcare services. So what those opposite have said is not true; it is just the usual rubbish that comes over the boundary. I am stunned that the Labor Party, who claim to represent the working class—which I have said before in this chamber is simply not true—are once again trying to make child care more expensive and less fair.

We on this side of the chamber are backing hardworking Australians, those who want to provide for their family and to get ahead. That is what I stand for. I am not sure what those on the opposite side stand for.

Mark Coulton (Parkes, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time for the debate has concluded.