Nick Xenophon blocks government's $4 billion childcare and welfare omnibus bill
Sydney Morning Herald
February 14, 2017
Nick Xenophon's Senate bloc will oppose the government's childcare and welfare omnibus savings bill, jeopardising the Coalition's attempt to jam through $4 billion worth of savings and reform measures.
Without Senator Xenophon's three votes, the package will require the unlikely backing of Labor or the Greens to pass the Senate. On Monday, the government attempted to pressure senators to support it by tying the savings to funding for the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
The omnibus legislation contains cuts to family tax benefits, paid parental leave and unemployment payments as well as increased and streamlined childcare subsidies. $3 billion would in savings would be directed to a fund for the NDIS.
The South Australian powerbroker branded the plan "robbing Peter to pay Paul", coming as the Greens and other crossbenchers labelled the plan as akin to blackmail.
"As a negotiating tactic, this is as subtle as a sledgehammer. Pitting battling Australians against Australians needing disability support services is dumb policy and even dumber politics," Senator Xenophon said in a statement.
"The trade off is simply too harsh," he told ABC radio, arguing that other savings should be found that wouldn't disadvantage families.
"We'll keep talking but we can't accept the package in its current form."
He also said he'd rather see a small increase in the Medicare Levy or the Medicare Levy Surcharge than cuts to welfare to pay for the NDIS.
Social Services Minister Christian Porter said he would have further discussions with Senator Xenophon on Tuesday to try and secure a way forward for the bill.
"I think the fundamental difficulty is the one that Nick has raised, which is that he does not consider it's a mechanism that he can support to find savings inside the family tax benefit system to pay for childcare," he told ABC radio.
"We've been very clear on that from the beginning. We want to keep working to make sure than people benefit from the childcare reforms, which again, as Nick noted, seem to be widely lauded."
Mr Porter said the government would continue to find funding for about $1.6 billion for childcare and defended linking the savings measures to the NDIS funding.
"I don't think it is, in any sense, wrong or a bad idea to - when you do identify savings - place them into an account and absolutely quarantine them for the NDIS," he said.
Labor MPs will finalise their position on the bill today but have been scathing about the cuts contained in it and the strategy of linking it to disability funding.
"This is a disgraceful political game of brinkmanship," said Labor's social services spokeswoman, Jenny Macklin.
The government has accused Labor of leaving a funding "black hole" for the NDIS in 2013.
"We inherited an empty promise from the previous government when it came to the NDIS. It wasn't fully funded. We have been working from day one to ensure that we fill that vacuum that was created by the previous government," Treasurer Scott Morrison said on Monday.
Greens finance spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young said the omnibus bill was "pure blackmail" from the government.
"Trying to pit one family against another, trying to say the care of a young child needs to be pitted against the care of people with disabilities... it is disgusting to see a government that is meant to be looking after people pitting communities against each other like this," she said.
"The Greens won't be standing for it and I know there are other people in the Senate who are increasingly concerned."
Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm said the government was book ended by the Xenophon bloc and conservatives including Cory Bernardi.
"The omnibus savings bill basically involves the continuation of a very large amount of middle class welfare, additional money for childcare and additional money for family tax benefits.
"The bottom line is this: if it doesn't save the taxpayers money, I'm not going to vote for it anyway. So Nick can talk about it all he likes, giving away more money and raising taxes... if it doesn't save money for taxpayers, if it doesn't go into reducing the budget deficit, I'm not going to vote for it and I suspect Cory [Bernardi] will do the same."
The Australian Council of Social Service also strongly rejected the linking of social security cuts to disability funding, saying that both areas needed to be funded properly.
"It is particularly egregious to be linking cuts to income support to the funding of the NDIS when the government legislated $4 billion over four years in personal income tax cuts last year for people earning $80,000 and over and is trying to push through a further $50 billion in company tax cuts," ACOSS chief executive Cassandra Goldie said.
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