Early childhood education is just as important as primary and secondary education, and as a society we shouldn’t be forcing parents to pay thousands of dollars just to access what should be an essential service.
Because of the income test required to access the childcare subsidy it is often cheaper for one parent to quit work rather than cover the cost of childcare. This disproportionately pushes women out of the workforce who continue to perform the bulk of the unpaid care labour in society. Meanwhile Australia currently has very limited paid parental leave, including only 2 weeks for dads.
The Greens will:
- Introduce 24 hours of universal, free childcare
- Scrap the ‘activity test’ that requires parents to work to access childcare
- Extend paid parental leave to at least 6 months paid at 100% of a parents’ salary up to $100,000
- Include a larger ‘take it or leave it’ portion of paid leave for dads