Statements by Senators - Child Care

I didn't intend to come into the chamber today and stand up to speak about child care, but after the disgusting and offensive reports about what went down in the government party room yesterday, how could I not come in here and speak about it? It is being widely reported that in that meeting a bloke or blokes in the Liberal-National party room, in a debate on desperately needed increased funding for child care, said that parents who are accessing child care were outsourcing parenting. How disgusting. What a stupid, hurtful, offensive statement, smearing every parent out there who is doing their best and every early educator who turns up to work each day and changes lives.

Of course, it's not the first of these kind of statements from those opposite. We have had Senator Rennick, who in May 2019 suggested that Labor's childcare plan was a conspiracy, saying:

“The cynic in me suggests this is another attempt by Labor to strengthen the role the state has in raising a child at the expense of the parents.”

In June 2020, in a bizarre reference to the Wizard of Oz, he said:

“Dorothy didn't tap her shoes together and say, 'There's no place like child care.' She said, 'There's no place like home.'”

Senator Canavan made his views on child care abundantly clear when he questioned whether we should be providing assistance for parents with newborn babies. Now there is the reported comment, yesterday, from a member of the government in their party room saying that child care is 'outsourced parenting'. How vile and how disgusting. I don't know who said what in that meeting yesterday; I'm not a member of their party room, thank God. But it is abundantly clear that these views aren't just old-fashioned; they are medieval. What an offensive and ill-informed smear on the parents of Australia doing their best and on those in our community educating our children.

I'm standing here to say I could not disagree with you more. It's disgusting. It is vile. And, to the parents of Australia who have their children in early learning who have made that decision for their families, I am standing here to say I stand with you. I say to the mums who are picking up their stethoscopes to head back to work on the front line of the COVID pandemic, I see you. I see you as you make the decision to have your child in care. I say to the dads working in our distribution centres to keep our economy moving, starting work often early in the morning before their little ones are up, who have their kids in child care, I see you. I see you dads as well. I say to the parents who are teachers returning to classrooms, who are returning to the office after having their children or to the factory floor, to drive the bus, to the aged-care homes, to the fire stations or to work on our check-outs, I see you. I see you and I feel your fury at those opposite who have dared to smear you, who have dared to smear your parenting choices. It's disgusting.

Then there are the early childhood workers in our country, who go to work every single day to change lives and to teach our most precious citizens, my son included, and to help them grow, to learn and to develop healthily and happily in a circle of security that they are part of and which supports families, not competes with them, and who have been on the front line of this pandemic. Our early childhood workers and our essential workers have felt unseen and unvalued by this government. Is it any wonder when things like yesterday happened? These workers aren't paid a fraction of what they deserve for the life-changing work they are doing. To these workers I say, I see you, I value you and I will always fight for you in here against these disgusting and vile attacks from those opposite.

I say to the parents working in the home, who have many joyful days, yes, and some really tough ones too, I'm sorry they've drawn you into this, some nonsense, stupid culture war which you didn't ask to be a part of. I'm sorry that they have tried to pit you against parents heading back into a different kind of work. I see that you're working, that we are all working and that as parents we are just trying to do our best. People like you, Senator Rennick, come to this place to smear parents. You come to this place to shame parents.

Australian parents deserve so much better than the smears we've seen reported. To say that they're outsourcing their parenting—how disgusting! I'm here standing for those parents. I'm here standing for the early educators looking after their children. I'm here standing for every Australian just trying to do their best each day. I see you parenting, I see you love your kids and I see the early educators who are there helping your family in that circle of security—together, side by side, with these families.