Mathias Cormann (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Finance) Share this | Hansard source

You cannot actually make blanket statements like that, because it really does depend on the individual circumstances of individual families. Family tax benefit payments depend on the various factors, including the age of the child. It obviously depends on your income levels. You are referring to people on the maximum rate of pay.

What I can tell you in relation to this is that this measure will contribute to ensuring the ongoing sustainability of the family payment system. The measure does apply to the maximum standard base rate and approved care organisation rate of family tax benefit part A and the maximum rate of family tax benefit part B. The lower income free area would continue to be indexed. That is an important point which means, depending on your level of income, you will actually continue to receive increases in payments, just not because of indexation in payment rates but because you move past certain eligibility thresholds. Other family tax benefit rate components—namely rent assistance, the newborn supplement and the multiple birth allowance—will also continue to be indexed.

All 1.4 million family tax benefit families will be affected by this measure, but that is actually the advantage because it means that the impact to achieve the $1.3 billion saving is minimised and that is precisely why Labor has pursued similar measures in the past. The family tax benefit rates—this is important to say—are not being reduced. Families will continue to receive assistance at current rates for another two years at least. Some families will receive more depending on their personal circumstances. In 2017-18, families receiving family tax benefit part A will forego increases of up to around $73 per child under 13 or around $91 per child aged 13 and above. It is important to also recognise that this proposal would not disproportionately affect regional Australians.