Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Child Care Rebate) Bill 2011. This bill is a timely reform and of extreme importance to many young families in my electorate of Greenway, balancing both the financial and non-financial challenges that are part and parcel of raising children. In a moment I will get to the hide of the member for Farrer, who just spoke, when it comes to our respective records on child care when in government. Firstly, I would like to talk about some of the rationale for the bill.

This bill is another realisation of this government’s commitment to Australian families, and child care in particular. In July last year, the government announced that families would be able to receive their childcare rebate payments more regularly from 1 July 2011, so that assistance may be provided when childcare fees are incurred. This bill delivers on this commitment. It is a direct response to an issue which has been consistently raised with me by many families in my electorate whom I meet and listen to on a regular basis. I congratulate the form minister Jenny Macklin and the current responsible minister, Kate Ellis, for championing this initiative and for being so responsive to the issues of constituents I have raised with them.

I have always believed that child care is a basic right for all families. Governments have an important role in ensuring that families are able to access quality and affordable childcare services. This government is committed to making positive changes for all families, including those with young children. We can see this commitment in amendments such as this one, and other legislation such as our landmark paid parental leave scheme, which has been enthusiastically welcomed by my constituents.

I am a passionate believer that government has a role in directly assisting families with child care, and the positive externalities that flow from this. The great thing about improving childcare legislation—which is what this amendment does—is that it facilitates at least two other major developments.

Firstly, a flexible and affordable childcare system allows our children to have access to early education. And early education allows for enhanced social development and learning opportunities at a young age. According to the Child care and early education in Australia report from 2009:

Children who did not attend a formal early childhood program had lower scores for receptive vocabulary than children in pre-year 1 and preschool programs.

Quality child care is therefore an integral stepping stone to prepare our children for the new environment that is primary education. I am reminded of this on a daily basis as I go to and from work and I drive past the Lalor Park Preschool Kindergarten, which I attended as a child. The second benefit that child care affords to families is workplace participation, particularly for women. This amendment makes it easier for parents to be afforded the dignity of re-entering the workforce and receiving the economic benefits that employment provides.

With around 690,000 Australian families eligible for childcare rebate payments, it is clear that a more flexible system is necessary to handle the myriad of different needs associated with such a vast number of families. Recently we celebrated International Women’s Day, a time to highlight some of the issues surrounding women. Of course, child care, access to work and access to other opportunities for women was an issue that was raised during many of these forums and discussions. I participated in many of these and at the forefront was the issue of managing the work-life balance. While we can never completely fix everyone’s challenges in this regard we can always work to make improvements to individual circumstances. This bill will work to increase flexibility and help the process of balancing the often competing responsibilities of employment and child care.

I would like to turn to some of the main provisions of this bill. In bringing forward this legislation the government has injected over $42 million into child care. The option of weekly or fortnightly childcare rebate payments will directly ease the pressures associated with child care, and is indicative of this government’s commitment to reforming what could be, for some, inflexible legislation, and amending laws to better suit the individual needs of families.

It is clear that a one-size-fits-all method of administering childcare rebate payments is not optimal. Not all children receive the same amount of childcare hours and not all children attend the same type of childcare provider. This bill will allow for a much more dynamic approach to managing childcare payments.

As there is no blanket method we can throw over all families, this bill will allow for a range of different options that families can use to achieve their childcare rebate payments. Families will have the option that operates now—that is, of receiving payments on a quarterly basis—as well as the option of payments going fortnightly into their bank accounts or to the childcare provider and the option of receiving an annual lump sum payment. This amendment to the act will allow families more freedom to decide when they receive this essential payment and where they want it distributed.

As a safeguard, families who choose to receive the fortnightly payment will see 15 per cent of their rebate withheld. This will ensure that overpayments do not accumulate throughout a financial year and clashes with childcare benefits do not occur. The balance of the funds withheld will be reconciled after the final quarter of the financial year to help balance out any changes in childcare benefit entitlement that might arise through families underestimating their income or through changes in circumstances.

I want to turn to the issue of council provided childcare services, specifically those of Blacktown City Council. Costs related to raising a young family are something felt by many in my electorate. Greenway—and west and north-west Sydney as a whole—is a rapidly growing area. Many of my constituents are hardworking young families who know the pressures of raising young children. The local government area of Blacktown, which falls across most of my electorate and across that of the member for Chifley, is the most populous in New South Wales and the fifth most populous in Australia. With 23.3 per cent of people in the Blacktown local government area aged between zero and 14, child care is a vital issue. According to the 2006 census, 12 per cent of families in Blacktown are single-parent families with children aged zero to 14. As I have said in this place on a number of occasions, it is for this reason that I often refer to Greenway as Australia’s nursery. The numbers speak for themselves. Flexible and affordable child care is critical. The rapid expansion, facilitated by new housing developments and other factors, has seen Blacktown’s population explode. With this comes the inevitable demand for increased community services.

Given the circumstances, I want to put it on record that Blacktown City Council has done an admirable job in trying to accommodate the rapidly growing need for child care. With around 25 childcare facilities in the Blacktown area operated by the council, the needs of many families are being very well met—although, due to economic constraints, it is impossible for local councils such as Blacktown to carry the weight of all childcare provision in our communities.

As Blacktown council has openly acknowledged, hardworking Australian families are still being adversely affected by the overhang from the childcare cuts of the last coalition government, the Howard government. Local councils have been left with the job of filling the void created by the coalition’s historic lack of funding when in office. Recently, the former member for Greenway, Mr Frank Mossfield, contacted me to discuss his concerns about long-term provision of childcare services in our area. His concern was about something he saw coming when he was Greenway’s local member. He was very perceptive. He knew during the coalition’s time in government what damage they were doing to the childcare sector and to families and what the result would be in the future. Speaking in this place in 2004, Mr Mossfield attributed the poor state of child care in this country to:

… a problem that has existed in Greenway since the first year of the Howard government. In the 1996-97 budget, there was an $820 million cut in child care, which led to increased fees, reduced child-care assistance and the closure of several services.

This is what the coalition did to child care in this country. Whatever way you cut it, it was a blatant disregard for Australian families. The 69,000 young people living in Greenway and Chifley using childcare services are still paying for it.

Not only were childcare services devastated by the Howard government’s cuts but employment opportunities for women were adversely affected as a result. I was on council from 2004, and during this time every local council throughout New South Wales, regardless of political make-up, agreed that local councils were not equipped to handle the unmet demand for childcare services that was a direct result of the Howard government’s cuts. Local government conferences were rife with discussion and motions of concern about the viability of childcare services in local government areas.

Due to the closure of childcare facilities and the increase in fees, many families could not afford child care. Consequently, many parents, including females, were forced to withdraw from the workforce. To give you an example, from 1996 to 2000, women’s employment participation in Fairfield and Liverpool, areas close to my electorate, fell from 49.9 per cent to 47 per cent. This bill is to redress the adverse affects of the former government’s actions. It represents this government’s commitment to child care and to supporting hardworking families.

I want to talk about some of the challenges we need to face and hurdles we need to get over to improve childcare services in this country. Flexibility and affordability are key concerns for this government. This bill is specifically targeted at improving these two aspects of child care for families. After the historical harm done to child care in this country by those opposite when in government, this government is committed to improving services for young families. The flexibility that this bill creates builds on this government’s reforms in the past, such as the 2008 increase in the childcare rebate. By providing more freedom to choose when childcare payments are received, families can better manage their budgets and thus better cope with the economic pressures associated with raising a young family.

I would like to take this time to mention an associated development in young children’s care and education. Today marks the beginning of National Playgroup Week. It was announced today that this government is providing $5 million as part of the Helping Children with Autism package to deliver playgroups that support children with autism spectrum disorder and their families. I thank the minister for this initiative. As I have mentioned a number of times in this place, including in my maiden speech, disability support in education is something that I feel very strongly about. As I mentioned, quality child care provides the necessary stepping stones for social development and academic success, and disability specific child care is no different—in fact, I believe it to be even more crucial. Today’s developments on this issue provide another example of how this government is supporting families with young children with disabilities. This bill will fundamentally improve affordability and flexibility for Australian families and make managing child care an easier task. That is why I strongly support this bill.

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