Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I think working families are interested in a couple of things, one of which is to make sure that the work laws of this country are fair. They are interested to know whether they will still be paid penalty rates. They will be very interested to know whether they are still going to be protected from unfair dismissal. They are going to be very concerned about whether or not they are going to be forced onto new style AWAs. That is what working families are concerned about, because each and very one of those things means dollars in the pay packet and the ability to put food on the table.

The second thing they are concerned about is people being fair dinkum about what is going to be delivered to them. What we have said is that we are delivering not through a tax on business but through the government stepping up to the plate and providing the paid parental leave scheme that the government proudly announced during the course of last year. We have costed it; we have done the right things about it. It is in the forward estimates for us to deliver. It comes into operation in 2011. That is what normal policy development is about. That is what we have done, that is what we stand for, and it is $10,000 more than was ever, ever put on the table by those opposite. Those opposite duck and weave around this fundamental breach in their commitment about no new taxes. This morning we heard the member for Murray asked about this—‘Well, we don’t call it a tax; we call it “an investment in human capital”‘. Good old Barnaby Joyce, when asked the same question, said, ‘Um, certainly we have to acknowledge that this is a tax.’ Thank you, Barnaby. We got it nailed in one from Barnaby. Those opposite are squirming because they have sought to try and put forward a policy snapped out of thin air.

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