Sue Lines (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to focus on one of the government's packages that it has been very proud of—that is, the child care package. I want to try to unpack what is in that package and look at some of the aspects that the government has either ignored or it thinks are too hard to solve.

It seems clear to me that Prime Minister Abbott has learnt nothing from last year's budget. This government has unfairness at its core. No matter how many times it tries to say that it is a fair budget or it is a fair government, fairness is something you believe in, not something you can just make up one day because it sounds like it is a good idea. Certainly, Labor stands for fairness, and we have a strong record of standing for fairness. But the Abbott government has no record on fairness. This budget certainly does not deliver the fairness that you will hear them talk about. Before this budget Mr Abbott promised that this budget would not be at the expense of the family budget. He has once again broken that promise. Mr Abbott's legacy will be as the Prime Minister of broken promises.

Let us pause for a moment and think about child care and what commitments were made during the election campaign and indeed over the last period of the Abbott government. They have promised that fees will be lower in the child care space. They have promised that there will be better access. But what has the government developed? Labor is concerned about where additional child care places will come from for these women who supposedly will be lured back to work by the family package. Where will those places come from? It does not look to me that there is a plan in the budget to find additional child care places. In fact, it is quite the reverse. That is an area that Labor will continue to focus on and look at closely.

We, the Labor Party, are concerned about reports and concerns from the child care sector itself that many, many families will be locked out of child care because of the work activity test. These are areas that we will look at closely. Last week, in Western Australia, a young woman who does not have family close by told me that she does not know how she will manage if she loses the two days a week that she currently has in child care and absolutely relies on. Labor knows that families are under significant financial pressures, especially with the cost of child care. One of the disappointments for families is that these changes to child care do not start until 2017—which means another whole year of high childcare fees. The cost of child care, by the government's own admission, is expected to go up by 20 per cent between now and 2017. That must be the biggest recorded increase in the history of subsidised child care in this country, and that is according to the budget papers—but, of course, you will not hear the Abbott government talk about that.

This means a huge increase in the out-of-pocket cost for families, and yet the government will provide no help to families with the costs of child care in the intervening period and, in fact, it wants to cut the family tax benefit in the meantime. The government has not tackled the increasing costs of child care. Giving more to some families completely ignores the market—and make no mistake, child care operates in a market. It is not a benevolent service; it operates in a market. Private operators comprise 70 per cent of the sector, and some within that market will take advantage of the extra subsidy by increasing their costs. Parents will be hit with the additional costs into the future and their out-of-pocket expenses will continue to rise, because the Abbott government has done nothing to look at how to curtail fee increases. And between now and 1 July 2017, when the new package takes effect, prices will rise.

Mr Morrison has told us that about 20 per cent of services are around and above the new benchmark price—20 per cent! How many services, or what percentage of services, are below the benchmark cost? We do not know that, and I am not sure that the government does, but it is something we will be pursuing in Senate estimates. The budget papers predict a 20 per cent rise in childcare fees. A 20 per cent rise is bigger than any other rise we have seen in the subsidised childcare area—and this from a government who promises high quality and low cost! Of course, it is another broken promise. If, by Mr Morrison's own admission and as the budget papers demonstrate, 20 per cent of childcare services are above the benchmark rate, where are the 80 per cent? Are they at or below the benchmark rate? It is a critical question that needs to be answered. When we look at the budget papers we see that the Abbott government does expect a significant rise in fees. What does that tell us? It will be a fee rise such as we have never seen before in this market as operators who sit below the benchmark—maybe 80 per cent, maybe not—lift their fees to the benchmark level before it comes into operation so that they maximise the government subsidy, because this is a market and fees do not go down.

This is surely an inflationary measure completely missed by the government. And of course there is nothing on the table about making extra places available for families, so even where families may want to take up the package, they will not be able to. The Abbott government has done nothing to reduce waiting lists. There are waiting lists of up to two years and more in our major cities. Family day care—a flexible option—was gutted in the last budget, forcing services to close. I have met with services in Western Australia, and last week a service provider told me they had lost seven educators and had closed up their business solely because of what the Abbott government had done. They had shut their doors, making fewer services available in the suburbs of Western Australia.

Family day care has been gutted again. The CEO of the Family Day Care Association states that, in the whole time that Mr Morrison has been the minister, he has not once visited their service—not once. Yet here we have family day care providers who are in our suburbs, who provide a home care environment, who provide early morning care, who provide late evening care, who provide weekend care—services that we know some families in our community need. These services have been gutted. And what has been put in their place? A trial for nannies. Family day care providers are regulated. They have to be trained. They are managed. They come within the licensing of the states. They are part of the National Quality Framework. They know what their role is and provide an exceptional service, yet these educators are being sacrificed so that we can have this trial of unregulated nannies who will not sit within the National Quality Framework.

What are we creating in this country? Will this be another area that labour hire companies get into to exploit 417 visa holders? Will this be another unregulated area where we see 417 visa holders being exploited, being underpaid, being treated appallingly, such as we saw on the Four Corners program a week or so ago? Because 417 visas are no longer holiday working visas; they are another form of exploitation of labour. They are completely unregulated, and the best the Abbott government can do is to pursue underpayment of wages.

It would be appalling if the area of childcare, where Labor has worked so hard to lift standards, was ripped apart because of this cheap, unregulated nanny scheme. And what of the low-paid educators who care for and educate the nation's children? There was nothing for them, so we will continue to see massive turnover of educators in this sector. The Abbott government has not done nearly enough in the area of early childhood.