Katy Gallagher (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

The government has said that we will fund that aged-care case. I thank you, Senator Rice, for the opportunity to again contrast the approach that we're taking in government as opposed to them when they were in, where they pursued vulnerable low-income Australians and threatened them with prison for an illegal scheme that they knew was illegal. That is the approach.

We are making room in our budget to fund priorities like aged-care wages. We had asked for a phased-in approach, just, again, to smooth our budget situation because of the impact. The cost to the budget is a multibillion-dollar cost. We've made some provision for that and we'll have a look at how much we have to adjust that for the budget, going forward. But, yes, we have said we will fully fund it because we value the work of aged-care workers and we understand they are underpaid. Unlike those opposite—for whom a deliberate design feature of their economic architecture was keeping wages suppressed—we do believe that those on low wages, like aged-care workers and other workers, deserve the support of their government. You will see a significant commitment in this budget to fund the costs of that case.