Kate Ellis, Subjects: Child care changes

Media Release

Kate Ellis

Shadow Minister for Education
 Shadow Minister for Early Childhood

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
DOORSTOP INTERVIEW
ADELAIDE
SUNDAY 1 NOVEMBER 2015


JOURNALIST: What do these changes mean for Australian mums and dads?

KATE ELLIS, SHADOW MINISTER FOR EARLY CHILDHOOD: Well what we know is that 21 months after the Government launched their child care review, and three child care Ministers later, we are still yet to see any firm child care policy from this Government. This is a government who said they would make child care more affordable, more accessible. Yet all we have seen is fees go up under this government, who have taken no action, except to cut a billion dollars from the child care support that families enjoy. We still know that this government is all about thought bubbles, they are not about serious policy.

We haven't seen a final policy from this Government, but the modelling that we have seen shows that even before today's statements, one in four Australian families would be significantly worse off under the Government's child care policy. It takes a certain amount of skill to spend an additional three and a half billion dollars to make hundreds of thousands of Australian families worse off when it comes to their child care fees.

What Australian families need is for the Government to actually provide some action on child care policy, not just keep changing ministers, changing policies, and not responding to any of the questions about the detail of the policy.

JOURNALIST: What specifically should they do?

ELLIS: Well we know that they need to outline how Australian families are going to be assisted by their action in child care policy. To date, we have seen announcements, yet we have not seen any of the detailed modelling. Let's be very clear, in the Government's Budget child care announcement, one in four Australian families will be significantly worse off despite the Government spending an extra $3.5 billion. Today we learn that they are taking action which may lead to more Australian families being worse off, yet what we are not seeing is any sense of fairness in the system.

JOURNALIST: Can you outline what sort of income thresholds you are talking about there in the one in four figure?

ELLIS: We know that this will significantly affect single-parent families and parents who might be casual workers, part-time workers. So we are talking about low and middle-income Australian families looking to be worse off as a result of this government's package. What we need from the Government is to outline specifically, clearly, how many families will be worse off as a result of their child care policy.

JOURNALIST: Do you take the view that $230,000 as a maximum figure as I read it, is generous, or too generous?

ELLIS: Oh look, we will certainly look at the detail of the Government's child care policy, if ever they choose to provide it. To date, they haven't. But what we do want them to answer is how many families will be worse off and by how much, and at what income are those families? Because whilst today they may be talking about families at the wealthier end, we know from modelling that has been released, that low and middle income families will also be hit hard as a result of the Government's changes.

ENDS