23rd Mar 2017, 9:58 PM – Senate Family Assistance Legislation Amendment (Jobs for Families Child Care Package) Bill 2016 - Third Reading - Pass the bill

The majority voted to pass the bill in the Senate. In parliamentary jargon, they voted to read the bill for a third time.

But since new amendments were agreed to in the Senate, the bill won't be made into law yet. First it needs to go back to the House of Representatives where they'll decide to either: (1) agree with the amendments so the bill will become law; or (2) disagree with the amendments and ask the Senate if they insist on them (if the Senate does, the bill can't become law because both levels of Parliament must agree on the wording of a bill).

What is this bill?

According to the bill's digest, if passed the bill will introduce a new child care fee assistance payment, the Child Care Subsidy (CCS), replacing two current payments: Child Care Benefit (CCB) and Child Care Rebate (CCR). It will also introduce a new supplementary payment, called the Additional Child Care Subsidy (ACCS), which will:

additional financial assistance for children at risk of abuse or neglect, families experiencing temporary financial hardship, families transitioning to work from income support, grandparent carers on income support, and low income families in certain circumstances. The ACCS partly replaces a number of current payments including Special Child Care Benefit, Grandparent Child Care Benefit and the Jobs, Education and Training Child Care Fee Assistance payment.