Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Hansard source

I am aware that those opposite presented something they called a policy during the election campaign. Mr Shorten said, in fact, 'No government deserves to govern if they do not have a plan for child care.' But unfortunately the Labor Party only had, essentially, a one- or two-year plan—a bandaid solution that was simply to move the existing cliff up, whereas we want to abolish that cliff. So they wanted to shift so that families would face another cliff in terms of their childcare support. We want to abolish it for low- and middle-income families and ensure that they can receive support every single day and every single month of the year for their childcare fees. We want to make sure that we have a system that keeps a downward pressure on fee increases, while the Labor Party proposed exactly the types of reforms that, when last implemented, saw fees skyrocket through the roof.

So there are alternatives, but they are flawed, failed models from the past, and what I hope we will see is common sense prevail, support for our savings, and support for reforms that help Australian working families who need it most.