Anthony Albanese is facing calls to bring forward his promise to make childcare much cheaper for all Australian families to early next year.
In one of his key election promises, the Labor leader promised to review a 90 per cent subsidy for all.
The measure could save a family earning $100,000 about $3,900 for a child in care five days a week.
A family with $175,000 could save about $10,400 a year, and people with higher incomes would save even more.
Labor leader Anthony Albanese visits a nursery in Kalamunda, which is in the coalition-controlled seat of Hasluck, on May 16. The Labor party won the seat at the election.
Labor has not set a timetable for the universal subsidy, but has promised to increase subsidies to provide more modest savings by July 2023.
Before the 90 per cent subsidy can be implemented, Labor will order a review by the Productivity Commission and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to ensure prices are regulated so suppliers do not simply increase their rates.
But Elizabeth Death, chief executive of the Australian Early Learning and Care Council, believes this can be done quickly and wants the 90 per cent subsidy to be in place by January 2023.
‘We would love to see that high subsidy rate implemented as quickly as possible. We know families need support,” he told Daily Mail Australia on Wednesday.
‘We want the government to act quickly because unless services are made cheaper and more affordable for families, we won’t really offer the same opportunities to all children.
‘We have some children who cannot access early learning due to cost.
He added: ‘We know that early learning has a huge impact on children’s wellbeing and parents depend on it to participate in the workforce.
“That’s why we strongly support moving this forward as quickly as possible.”
Death said the Coalition showed it was possible to make changes quickly after Scott Morrison quickly made it cheaper to care for second children during Covid.
“We saw the Morrison government implement its policy very quickly around second and subsequent children, which was a great measure of affordability,” he said.
‘We know that legislative and administrative work has to be carried out, but we now have a track record that departments can do as much as they can and we can do it in a shorter period of time.
“We hope it will start in early 2023,” he said, referring to the 90 percent universal subsidy.
Labor has not set a timetable for the universal subsidy, but has promised to increase subsidies to provide more modest savings by July 2023.
‘The productivity query and ACCC query will need to happen very quickly, but you need to work in the background to get them up and running.
“I don’t think that’s impossible.”
With a 90 percent universal subsidy, a family earning $100,000 would see its subsidy increase from the current rate of 75 percent for the first child.
This would save them $3,900 based on the cost of a child before subsidies of $26,000 a year.
A family earning $178,000 would pay only $2,600 a year instead of $13,000, saving them $10,400 a year.
Families earning more than $400,000 and not currently receiving subsidies would save $23,400.
Meanwhile, the Labor Party has committed increase child care subsidy rates for every family earning less than $530,000, costing taxpayers 5.4 billion dollars in four years.
Sarah Mawhinney, chief executive of the McKell Institute, said: ‘The economic and social benefits of reducing childcare costs cannot be underestimated.
‘Reducing the cost of childcare will have a real and immediate impact, easing the cost of living pressures many families face.
‘Crucially, measures to reduce childcare costs could have the additional impact of increasing female participation in the workforce.
“Affordable child care will allow women previously excluded from the workforce due to the prohibitive costs of child care greater flexibility in making decisions about re-entering the workforce after maternity leave.”
This table shows the increase in Labor subsidies based on income. It hopes to incorporate them and also conduct a productivity review on a 90 percent universal subsidy.