Interview - ABC News Breakfast

EMMA REBELLATO: Well let's get more on one of our top stories, the news about that funding for a child care worker pay rise. Education Minister Jason Clare joins us in the studio. Minister, good to see you.  

JASON CLARE, MINISTER FOR EDUCATION: Good to see you, morning.  

JAMES GLENDAY: Good morning.  

REBELLATO: Were you forced into this decision for this pay rise?  

CLARE: Well I think this is something that we had to do. You know, child care workers, early educators do some of the most important work in this country. They care for and they educate our kids. But until we took this step about 18 months ago, you wouldn't know but they were some of the lowest paid workers in the country.  

They love what they do but love doesn't pay the bills, and we saw over the last few years a lot of child care workers leave the profession to go and work at Woollies or Bunnings because they could earn more there. Turns out when you pay people more, more people want to do the job, and over the last year and a half or so we've increased the workforce by 20,000, and the vacancy rate at child care centres has dropped by 31 per cent, the vacancy rate for staff. So it's working. That's why we need to continue it. But not just continue it, there's two other elements to this. In order for centres to get the money to pass on to their staff they've also got to cap fee increases. So that helps to keep price increases down for more than a million parents who rely on this as an essential service every day.  

But there's another condition that we're adding today as well, and that is you don't get the money unless you meet the minimum national safety standard. We talk about in on the show a bit.  

REBELLATO: Yep.  

CLARE: 95 per cent of centres meet that minimum safety standard, but after everything we've seen and heard in the last 12 months, I formed the view, and I suspect every parent watching would agree with me, that if you're going to get this money it should be mandatory that you meet the minimum safety standard. It's 95 per cent now, I want to get it to 100 per cent, and so that's part of the conditions we're imposing on centres here today.  

GLENDAY: We might come to some of those standards in a moment, I just want to take you back to Emma's question. Just in the lead up to this we had warnings there could be strikes, there were warnings that centres would be putting up their prices if you didn't do what you've done today. Was that a real risk, and this was a funding in the budget, had you already allocated for this to happen?  

CLARE: We hadn't made that decision because we were still working through the details, including those conditions around safety. But the truth is if we didn't do this then the out of pocket costs for parents would increase by about 18 per cent. So that would be a massive cost of living hike for more than a million Australians around the country. And, you know, we'll see what the Liberal Party or One Nation have to say about this today, but this is the sort of thing that they would be unlikely to support, and this is the sort of thing I think is in the public good. It locks in pay increases for people who do important work, it helps to keep prices down for parents because you don't get the money unless you keep price increases below a certain amount, and it actually does something good to keep our kids safe.  

REBELLATO: So you said it wasn't in the Budget so how are you going to pay for it, the money's got to come from somewhere?  

CLARE: It's about three and a half billion dollars. You know, the way the system works is if we didn't do this it would still cost taxpayers money, because centres would put prices up, parents would have to pay for that. But the way the child care subsidy works is that money would flow there too. So this avoids that, that provides the funding direct to the workers and avoids parents copping it in the neck.  

GLENDAY: Just on centres that don't meet standards, you've been talking about this for a number of years. At what point, I guess some viewers might be thinking at what point do you go, "Right, we are going to really   we're not just cracking down, we're actually taking action. If you're not meeting a standard you're not looking after kids"?  

CLARE: Well that's what this is. And to be fair to the State regulators, we're seeing action in the last 12 months on a scale that we haven't seen before. There's more checks of centres in the last 12 months than ever before. More centres are meeting that quality standard than ever before. But I want it to be even higher. And I figure the people watching here would say that if you're getting taxpayer money you should meet the standard.  

The legislation we passed that says we can cut funding off if you don't meet quality standards is working. You know, we talk about this on the show from time to time.  

CLARE: We've seen, you know, dozens and dozens of centres that flat out refuse to meet standards for years suddenly meet them. Ones that don't have shut, but I think this takes it to the next level. If you want more taxpayer funding to pay your staff more, then meet the safety standard that parents expect, that our kids deserve.  

REBELLATO: You mentioned the Coalition, you also mentioned One Nation. Pauline Hanson's going to speak at the National Press Club today for the first time.  

REBELLATO: She's been in politics for decades as we know. What do you make of this? What are you expecting? Do you think there'll be policy announcements? Are you expecting her to face more scrutiny?  

CLARE: I honestly don't know. I mean all we do know, basically One Nation is the Liberal Party with a different logo. It's the same sort of policies.  

REBELLATO: Is it really?  

CLARE: Well think about it. They don't support increases in the minimum wage. They wouldn't support pay rises for the sort of workers we're talking about today. They want to make it easier to sack people. They want to stop funding to the ABC. They don't even support free TAFE to train more tradies and apprentices. And in my patch, where I cut student debt for 3 million Aussies by 20 per cent, they oppose that as well.  

They say no to everything. The only thing they say yes to is Gina Rinehart. So when I say that they're pretty similar to the Liberal Party, I think the facts bear that out.  

GLENDAY: Are you able to just sort of project your views on it, because we really don't know what One Nation's policies are on a whole range of things because they're never really asked. Do you think they need more scrutiny?  

CLARE: Of course, all political parties need more scrutiny. That's what democracy's about. That's what the ABC and the media are about, is about scrutinising politicians.  

You know, I take them seriously because a lot of Australians are doing it very tough at the moment, and when Australians are doing it tough they look to parties like this for answers. I guess what I would say is they're full of anger, but they don't have the answers that Australians need.  

Government is hard. You know, there's no magic wand in government to fix everything. But you do need to do the sort of responsible things that help people. Tax cuts start on the 1st of July. Pay increases like this. The steps we're taking to cut the cost of petrol, which is now a little bit cheaper than it was before the war started in Iran. The extension of paid parental leave which goes to 26 weeks, it'll help a lot of new mums and dads. That starts on the 1st of July.  

And then the big thing, there's so many young people out there at the moment who are giving up on buying a house. They think they've got to rent forever. That's not good enough. Parties like One Nation and the Liberal Party say that the current system's fine. The Labor Government says no, that the system's broken and we've got to do something about it to make it easier for the next generation of Australians to buy their own home.  

GLENDAY: Yes, and the ABC was banned by Pauline Hanson for a bit, I'm not sure if that ban's still in place. But anyway, you'll be able to watch that National Press Club address later today on the ABC.  

Before we let you go, Minister, you're looking great in your blue.  

CLARE: Thank you.  

GLENDAY: Are you going to the game tonight? And how are you going to celebrate when New South Wales goes up two nil?  

REBELLATO: Ooh, this is a factional show, James.  

GLENDAY: We've got to call it early.  

CLARE: No, no, I'm not going to the game. Heading back to Sydney. Sydney's home for me. So hopefully tonight I'll be on the lounge with my two little boys and hopefully we'll have fingernails left at the end of it.  

GLENDAY: Fingernails at the end. Don't worry, it's going to be a good night, and if it's not I might not be in at work tomorrow.  

REBELLATO: Oh great.  

GLENDAY: Jason Clare, thank you very much.