Rod Kemp (Victoria, Liberal Party, Minister for the Arts and Sport) Share this | Hansard source

I was not planning to speak, but I have been listening very carefully, as I always do, to the senator’s remarks and I feel that it is important to put a number of things on the record so that people who may read the Hansard or may have the opportunity to hear this broadcast will see the very large gaps and, I have to say—and I regret to say it—the touch of hypocrisy in the Labor Party position. We have heard a number of Labor Party contributions on this child-care motion. Child care is important. It is important to this government and, one would think from the speeches we have heard, it is important to the Labor Party.

I will be looking at Mr Beazley’s speech this evening, as it appears that Labor wishes to spend even more on child care. Let us see whether that occurs in the alternative budget being presented this evening. Labor wants to make major changes—I will not call them reforms—to child care. Let us see whether it is given a priority in Mr Beazley’s budget reply tonight. I suspect that, like in so many things, when it comes to taking action the Labor Party will be MIA—missing in action. Those who have listened to the senator’s speech will not be surprised if little, if anything, of substance is delivered in terms of Labor Party policy. It is worth putting on record that the government has committed an additional $120.5 million in the 2006-07 budget to provide an even more responsive child-care system for parents. This is a very significant increase in funding. But the Labor Party thinks that more money should be put in. We will see in the alternative budget.

The government has removed, as a number of my colleagues have said, the caps on the number of approved child-care places for out of school hours care and family day care. Long day care is already uncapped. Let us look at the historical statistics on this. These have been quoted in the debate today, but it is worth making the point. Apparently the Labor Party gave a high priority to child care when it was in government. How many child-care place were there when Senator Sherry was on the government benches? In 1996, there were 300,000 places. In 2005, there were 600,000 places. That is astonishing growth, unmatched by anything that Labor has been able to put up over the years.

It is often said in this chamber that it is a great pity the Labor Party did not spend an extra year in office, because all those wonderful things that they had forgotten to do in their 13 or so years in office could have all been done in that final year. The trouble is, the Labor Party comes with form, and when you look at that form you find that the Labor Party talks a lot and complains a lot but does not deliver and does not deliver real policy. Senator Sherry being here in the chamber reminds me that we had to wait eight years for a superannuation policy from him. That is a very long time to be producing a superannuation policy. The truth is, I think the Labor Party and, indeed, Senator Sherry, who is meant to be their in-house expert on superannuation, would have been stunned by the magnificent reforms that the Treasurer announced on Tuesday. When great things happen, the Labor Party often say, ‘That was our policy.’ I do not think anyone is saying that Senator Sherry produced a policy which could have matched the major reforms that have been undertaken in super and have been very widely welcomed by the wider community.

The parents using child-care places will be eligible for subsidised child care through the child-care benefit, and this is one of the most significant changes to the provision of child-care places in Australian public policy history. It is a big statement, and that is the case—it is the most significant change since the Howard government introduced the child-care benefit. Parents on income support, such as the parenting payment, who are re-entering the workforce will also benefit from this budget with increased funding to the JET Child Care program, which pays almost all the child-care gap between fees and CCB.

This government has brought down one of the great reforming budgets in Australian political history. I think the stunned looks on the faces of the Labor Party when the Treasurer announced the very wide-ranging changes, from tax reform through, as we mentioned, to child care to superannuation to infrastructure to research, showed that this is a government that does have a vision. This is a government that—