Shooters, Fishers and Farmers candidate Sam Romano has called on the government to do more to help combat the gender inequality gap by making childcare cheaper for parents.
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The focus comes days after the Labor Party announced a $4 billion dollar childcare package which planned to make childcare free for 370,000 families across the country by subsidising worker costs.
While Mr Romano called Labor's plan a good step in the right direction in helping alleviate the costs of living for families, he said the money needed to go directly to parents instead of to childcare centres themselves.
One wonders why you would bother going to work.
- Sam Romano
"How much of that does the actual worker earn and putting money back into the mums who are paying it out," he said.
"I want to see the government subsidise the parents."
The SFF candidate said while doorknocking in the electorate, he'd been told the cost of living was the major issue for most people, with childcare taking up a significant portion of the costs.
In some cases, Mr Romano said, women were earning as little as $40 more a week than the total cost of childcare.
"There should be some subsidisation by the government and I'll be pushing for that to help them with the cost of childcare," he said.
"Mums are working and their wage virtually goes all to the childcare centre so they're working for a very low amount of money, and they don't have enough to go inter superannuation."
Mr Romano said Labor's plan was a good start, but there was "much more" to be done to help parents, in particularly women, who wanted to work.
"We talk about gender equality and this is one we could be looking at," he said.
I don't have figures but I'd like to see at least a subsidisation of 50 per cent, [that] would be a good start.
- Sam Romano
"[Women are often] too busy raising their children and but they also miss out on their careers so I want to see more money into the cost of childcare directly to the parents, whether they're mums or dads and it would make a big difference."
"One wonders why you would bother going to work."
However, there was no concrete plan or details at to how Mr Romano's focus on providing childcare assistance for families would logistically work.
"I don't have figures but I'd like to see at least a subsidisation of 50 per cent, [that] would be a good start," Mr Romano said.
"It's just a preliminary suggestion which I think should go forward and we'll make more enquiries and look into it."
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