Mehreen Faruqi (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to Minister Watt, representing the Minister for Early Childhood Education. Today, thousands of early childhood educators around the country have walked out of centres. The low pay and difficult conditions these workers are subjected to are a national shame. Educators deserve professional pay that reflects the skill and responsibility of the work that they do every single day. But instead of immediately committing the funding necessary to lift these workers wages, the Labor government is going ahead with the stage 3 tax cuts for the wealthy—tax cuts that economists tell us will overwhelmingly flow to men as well. Why is the government sticking with the obscene stage 3 tax cuts, when it should be using the money to lift wages of early educators and carers—who are mostly women?