Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration) Share this | Hansard source

Senator Back, did you bring a sheep into this chamber? If you did you need to control it. As a vet, Senator Back, you need to control your sheep.

As I was saying, the childcare sector—the people who are allegedly going to be the beneficiaries of this legislation—have come out and said to the government: 'You can't do this. You are creating a two-tiered system within child care in Australia.' But why does that surprise me? Those on the other side play elitist politics every day of the week. Those on the other side love class warfare. This is exactly what this bill does. They throw $300 million at United Voice. United Voice can then run around on a membership drive and sign up a few extra people. And they will be telling them that they are going to get a pay rise, and that is blatantly misrepresenting what this legislation does. But at least the childcare sector knows that this legislation is nothing more and nothing less than confirmation of what we already knew about the former Gillard government—and quite frankly the current Rudd government. And we all know that Senator Wong voted for Rudd, the sisterhood stabbing one of their own in the back. You always have to like it, don't you, when the sisterhood stab one of their own in the back? Stabbing people in the back is exactly what this legislation does.

What is worse than the fact that this is merely for a union membership drive and worse than the fact that 40 per cent or fewer of the sector will qualify is that the fund runs out after two years and then there is no money; no money at all. The Labor Party, the party of the workers, throw a bit of money at a few people in the sector and pretend that they are saving the world and giving them a huge pay rise—and they pretend that they are the party of the workers—when in reality this is nothing more and nothing less than one of the worst con jobs that has ever come before this chamber.

Then you have the childcare centres, who have said to the government in submission after submission: 'We are concerned. What happens if we apply for these funds and are not successful? What do we then go back and say to our workers? Our union, United Voice, told the workers they're getting a pay rise. But under the guidelines, they're not getting a pay rise. What do we say to the workers?' I can tell you what United Voice are going to be saying: they are going to be saying, 'That bad employer refused to pass that pay rise on.' But there will be no pay rise; there never was a pay rise. This legislation is just smoke and mirrors, nothing more and nothing less.

What is worse is that a lot of the childcare centres have said that, as a result of this grubby little piece of legislation, they are going to have to raise the wages that they pay to compete with those who may get a wage rise courtesy of the government. But they cannot afford to. All this government is doing is creating a two-tiered system in Australia. But you would expect nothing more and nothing less from those elitists on the other side.