Speech on Cheaper Childcare Bill

I rise to speak on the Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Cheaper Child Care) Bill 2022. My children are in child care this week. It's what enables me to be here to do my job, to be here to lower the cost of child care for 6,800 families in my electorate. I want to start by saying thank you to our early childhood educators: thank you for educating the next generation; thank you for making both our economy and our society work; thanks for all the work you do before you even step into an early education centre, in studying and learning about early childhood development. I know how important your work is, not just because of what I've seen in my own children, which I will talk about more in a moment, but also because I have seen my mother do that work. My mum was an early childhood teacher for a number of decades. I'm so proud of the work that Wendy has done in building up the next generation, and it's always a delight whenever I'm with her in Fremantle and one of her former students comes up to her and says, 'Thank you.' To see the joy on both their faces is something incredibly special.

We know our early educators and early childhood education give children the best start in life. That's why I also say thank you to those who campaigned for this change—organisations like the Parenthood, Thrive by Five, the United Workers Union, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Western Australia, and centre directors and staff from across Australia, to name just a few. I've seen the benefits of a quality early childhood education on my own household. Last week my son, Leo, turned five—happy birthday again, Leo! He never gets sick of hearing that. I give a special congratulations to Jess, who met the objectives that he set out in a dinosaur-Lego-rocket-themed birthday cake. She met that brief well. We've all heard the evidence that 90 per cent of brain development happens in the first five years. My son turned five—he's done! He's 90 per cent done, 10 per cent to go. But I've seen the benefits of that early learning. He writes stories, he writes songs, he can add and subtract, and he can count to 100. He can ask questions about anything, and his emotional intelligence has turned him into an incredibly kind and compassionate young person. I know that early years education made that difference.

One of the things I want to articulate in this debate is on how many different fronts this investment that we as a parliament are making delivers. Childcare investment delivers education for more Australians. This childcare investment will deliver support for vulnerable and disadvantaged children. It will deliver more emotional support for more Australian children. It will deliver on cost-of-living pressures, making sure that more people can afford to get their children into early education for more days. It will deliver on gender equality. It will deliver on higher superannuation balances for women. It will deliver more skills into our economy. It will deliver more prepared students into primary school and beyond. It will deliver improved literacy. It will deliver improved numeracy. It will deliver a growing Australian economy, and it is an investment in our nation's future.

Both sides of this House agree that Australia still has a way to go when it comes to achieving true gender equality. We know that we need to make those steps in that direction because it is not only the right thing to do and the overdue thing to do but also the smart thing to do. We know that so much more economic growth is available to this nation when we harness the full potential of all of us. We can also ensure that we provide increased financial security and more leadership opportunities and break what has been an accepted policy design in this place for too long, where the cost of child care presents itself as a barrier to women entering further into the workforce, forcing them to reduce their hours and to turn down opportunities. For many families, it often makes financial sense for a parent—often the mother—to stay at home and work fewer hours. In 2021 there were 73,000 people across this country who wanted to work but were not looking for work purely because of the cost of child care. Surely we can do something and surely we cannot go another year with that being the case. That's why this legislation is so important.

It's important that we recognise that we will be doing this within the first 12 months of the Albanese government. I don't know who else in this place had an opportunity to do something about this earlier. I've even advocated in the past. I wrote in 2020 that I believed that the former Morrison government should have stolen the policy that we put out, which now-Prime Minister Albanese introduced in his budget reply.

We owe it to those families who want more support to do something about it. It's as simple as that. The Treasury estimates about the impact of this bill are promising, suggesting it will increase the hours worked by women with young children by up to 1.4 million hours per week. That's the equivalent of an extra 37,000 full-time workers. And it's not just those workers who will benefit. We know that one-third of mothers work in industries facing severe shortages. They work in our hospitals, our aged-care homes, our schools and across our society, filling essential jobs in every facet of life. We want to help them get back into the workforce and fill those skills gaps.

This will come into effect next year, some 80 years after the Commonwealth first engaged in the business of financially supporting what were then called—to quote John Curtin—'women war workers', providing money for creches for their children. I think it's amazing that, in the depths of World War II, that was the first time the Commonwealth engaged in the direct funding of early childhood education and care so that we could fill—again—skills gaps in our economy. I think it's worth noting that, both times, it has been Labor that has made these big steps in the right direction to support families who want to work—who we as a society need to work—by supporting properly funded early childhood education and care.

This bill shows that we are determined to support families, particularly in the times we face. We know how many Australian families are already struggling to make ends meet. Childcare fees increased some 41 per cent under the coalition government, meaning that parents, year on year under the Liberals and the Nationals, had to sit down and consider really difficult questions: How much money is left after paying the childcare bills? How many days should they or their partner work? Is it worth working the fourth or the fifth day? Those questions denied our economy workers and skills but also denied children access to the value of a high-quality early childhood education and care environment.

What we see is, finally, a government that is absolutely determined to make sure we act on child care, act on this big cost-of-living pressure, at one of the most expensive times for families, when they have a new young person in the family. They are very demanding. They need lots of care and attention. And the bills do start to add up. So I would just say to those who are not yet convinced or are maybe considering amendments to this legislation: let's get it through. Let's get it done. Families have waited for nine long years. They finally have a government that wants to act and value early childhood education and the educators who work in this sector. I'll finish my remarks where I started: thank you to the educators of Australia. Thank you for what you do day in, day out to invest in and educate the next generation of Australians.