Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Greens will not object to recommitting the motion if that is what needs to be done to reflect the true will of the Senate, but I would like to take this opportunity to highlight the hypocrisy of the opposition. Yesterday we heard over and over again about how they want a better scheme, they want six months, they want superannuation—they want all these things included in paid parental leave, but they were not prepared to stand by them when those amendments were put up. They said, ‘When we get into government we’ll do this, this, this and this.’ It is fairly clear. But their argument was, ‘We didn’t want to frustrate the process.’ I think the antics of yesterday afternoon and again this morning show that the opposition are more than happy to frustrate the process.

In fact, where you are frustrating the process is that you are looking after the bosses, not the mums who have to work and care for their kids. You were not standing up for them yesterday. You were not prepared to put their needs ahead of your issues in relation to frustrating the process or frustrating the government. But you are more than happy to simply stand up for the bosses. Rather than ensuring that women get the length of time that they need, six months, which is apparently your policy, and rather than giving them superannuation, which you agree should be included, you are now not standing up for the policy that you said you held and said you want. Instead, now you are frustrating the process by saying that you want to get rid of the one thing in this bill that is any type of attachment to the workplace.

There are flaws in this bill. It is interesting to hear the minister stand up and say, ‘Oh, well, we need this because this scheme is not about a welfare payment; it is about an entitlement to leave.’ We obviously know that that is a flaw. I spoke about it in my speech and at the Senate inquiry. It is out there on the public record. The government’s own department and drafters of this bill admit that this is a payment scheme, not a scheme that gives you a right to leave. Yet the one part of this legislation which ensures that there is some element—it may be small, but there is some element there—of the idea of attachment to the workplace for women and which therefore perhaps leads in some way to deal with that workforce participation criterion and objective is this issue of the payroll master. That is the only piece of this bill that does that, and the opposition want to kick it out. They are prepared to stand up for the bosses but not stand up for the mothers. That is what this is about.

Your leader goes out there and says, ‘We want six months; we want superannuation,’ but you do not stand for it when it counts. It is spineless—absolutely spineless. Here you are bowing to the bosses because they are obviously your constituents. You do not care about the mothers. You do not care about the dads. You do not want a good scheme in place. This is all politics for you. You had a chance to introduce a six-month scheme to improve this piece of legislation. You had a chance to include superannuation, which is apparently your policy. And you wimped out. Not only is Tony a phoney but he is a wimp too.