Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Nationals) Share this | Hansard source

The Social Security and Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (2009 Budget Measures) Bill 2009 substantially deals with two measures from the budget.

The first aspect of this bill is the provision for an ongoing lump sum payment of $600 a year for people on carer allowance and on carer payments. This provision effectively regularises payments that have been made since 2004 under the Howard government. I would like to take this opportunity to place on record—and I am sure that this is shared in a bipartisan sense—the great appreciation of parliament for the fantastic work of carers in Australia. I suspect it would not matter how much we paid them; most Australians would agree that it would never make up for the huge contribution they make not only to the people who they care for but, of course, to the wider community.

In 1998 the former coalition government extended the support to carers of children with a profound disability. I think it was in 2004 that we introduced the carer bonus payment, which was a one-off carer bonus payment of $1,000 to each person in receipt of the carer payment and $600 to each recipient of a carer allowance, which was then announced in the 2004-05 budget. In effect, that continued until this day. What this provision does is regularise that payment.

The only other aspect of this bill of note is to suspend for three years the indexation of the income threshold to the people accessing family tax benefits. This is a straight savings measure and is non-controversial. It will not be opposed by those on this side. Again, the carers are the unsung heroes of the Australian community, and I feel that these payments only really give recognition and acknowledgement to the work that they do. I commend this legislation to this place.