Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Hansard source

As I indicated earlier, the government supports and accepts the amendment from Senator Hinch, which, as Senator Hinch and Senator Leyonhjelm indicated, has been the subject of discussions. In introducing these reforms, the government had sought to calibrate the rate of childcare subsidy to more closely align with a fair and equitable means testing regime. That is why it goes up for low- and middle-income families under our reforms and goes down for higher income families.

We have accepted the argument that at some point it should cut out, and putting that close to the point where it was going to taper down to 20 per cent in any event seems to be a reasonable point at which we do not believe there would be profound impacts in terms of workforce participation or the benefits we seek to realise through child care. I note, as I have said before in terms of early education, that universality is provided via universal access to preschool. Of course, we have discussed quite a bit tonight all the other opportunities and support to access early education through the childcare service for families, including families with children at risk and low-income families. Of course, these arrangements will not prevent other families from choosing to continue to do so.

Question agreed to.

Bill, as amended, agreed to.

Bill reported with an amendment; report adopted.