Jodie Belyea (Dunkley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Social Services. How is the Albanese Labor government delivering for Australian families in social services, and what puts this at risk?

Tanya Plibersek (Sydney, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I really want to thank the member for Dunkley for her question, because I know that not only is she a great supporter of the work that this government is doing on family and domestic violence but she knows how important the increases to pensions and other payments in her electorate have been.

I'm very proud to say that on this side of the House we are absolutely focused on helping Australian families. That means up to $5,000 extra if you're on a pension. It means $1,800 extra in rent assistance. It means cheaper medicines, cheaper child care, higher wages, lower taxes, five per cent deposits, cuts to student debt, free TAFE—a whole range of measures to take pressure off families, including almost doubling the amount of paid parental leave since we've come to government. Australians getting paid parental leave are about $12,000 better off under this prime minister. So, after 40 weeks of carrying a baby, mums and dads can look forward to six months off.

But I'd say this Leader of the Opposition, after 39 weeks of carrying the Liberal Party, can also look forward to a little bit of time off from the job. It's interesting that the member for Hume has said that a crusade was needed to attract more women to the Liberal Party. He said:

We absolutely need more women in the party at every level …

I don't think he meant every level.

Let's not forget it's the member for Hume that trashed the economic reputation of the Liberal Party. He went to the last election promising both higher taxes and higher deficits. He's the man who hid energy price increases. He released those dodgy documents around Clover Moore's travel. There's the Jam Land saga. There are the dodgy water buybacks. He said he lived up the road from Naomi Wolf at Oxford. She wasn't there at the time. It was reported that a prominent Liberal woman said of the member for Hume, that he is a 'caricature of a Liberal male—males who have managed to progressively alienate women from the Liberal Party'. It does seem to me that, any day of the week, an average bloke in the Liberal Party wins over a woman, and the only real qualifications you need are the XY chromosomes.