I don’t know what goes on at your house, but Bill Shorten was bang on the money about mine

PEOPLE might be angry about Bill Shorten’s comments on women and childcare, but Em Rusciano says he’s bang on.

IS BILL Shorten a sexist or a realist?

That is the question being asked after he unveiled his $3 billion childcare package yesterday.

During the announcement he said women have the “second job in the family” and were primarily responsible for childcare.

“Let’s face it, men in Australia rely on the women in Australia to do the childcare and to organise childcare,” he said.

“Where you’ve got mums working part-time or fulltime, it’s the second job in the family, and frankly they’re doing a lot of the unpaid work — they’ve got to try to work out the childcare bills.”

All round goddess and host of Today Lisa Wilkinson certainly felt he was out of touch to say the least, accusing Shorten of “entrenching a stereotype that women are second class citizens” on her show this morning.

The thing I ask is, does describing the facts of a particular situation mean you are entrenching the information or simply stating what the reality is?

I think it is important to differentiate between how we would like things to be — men and women sharing child care responsibilities equally — and how they actually are. Because I don’t know what goes on in your house but in mine, Shorten was bang on the money.

I’m in charge of most of the decisions when it comes to the kids.

I organise our schedule, I provide most of the meals, I’m the first emergency contact on their school and sport forms. I work fulltime and then come home and work what feels like another fulltime job here.

If I need to go away for work I have to arrange all the school drop offs and picks ups. Excel spreadsheets are made and charts and schedules written and emailed to five different family members. NASA launches have gone ahead with less organisation!

When the girl’s dad goes away, he packs his bag three hours before he needs to get on the plane and that’s it.

Em Rusciano takes on most of the parenting duties.

That’s not all his fault or Bill Shorten’s — part of it is mine for enabling it to happen.

I do it because it’s easier, it’s always been that way and I like to know what’s going on. To be perfectly honest, the thought of stepping back and having to wait for him to catch-up and get it functioning like the well oiled machine that it currently is, makes me want to throw-up.

I also know that not ALL families in Australia operate like this. Should Shorten have said “parents” instead of “mothers” — yes he probably should have. Large sweeping statements spoken as absolutes rarely turn out well for anyone, that’s on the first page of “Politics for Idiots”.

But let’s not get caught up in the language here, let’s focus on the fact that this situation needs to change.

Do you know why women are the ones who typically make the decisions and organise the child care? Do you know why it is that women are the ones who tend to stop working or work less or change jobs or work more flexibly after having kids? I would guess that it’s because:

A) We pushed the kid/s out.

B) WE ARE USUALLY PAID LESS MONEY!

The situation surrounding point A cannot be changed in the near future so let us focus on B shall we?

I stayed home with both our kids after having them, I researched the childcare centres, I gave up my career because for us at the time, it was the sensible financial decision.

I think that’s probably the case for MOST (take note Billy boy, I said “most” not “all”) parents. The worst thing about what Shorten said was that he was assuming dudes earn more. And the worst part about that is, he’s right. That’s the really s**thouse thing about this situation.

But besides fixing gender inequality, the other thing that needs to happen is that men should be encouraged to be involved in the issue of childcare. Making sure the children are covered so that an income can be earned effects both mothers and fathers, and if more men step forward and say that they care about childcare and that it would change their vote, I think the language might start to change.

Is Shorten sexist? No, I don’t believe he is. I am sure MANY women read his comments, sighed and thought “I don’t like it but it’s true”.

Some may have just heard them and thought, “yes you’re stating the obvious what are you going to doing about it?”

I don’t like hearing that women are left to take care of the childcare, insinuating that men need to be free of the entanglements of family so that they may go about the business of doing the things that really matter. But in 2016, that is still the reality of many mothers in this country.

We need to look at the reasons WHY that is, and start fixing them.

Em Rusciano is a comedian, writer, singer and regular news.com.au columnist. You can follow her on Facebook.

Originally published as I don’t know what goes on at your house, but Bill Shorten was bang on the money about mine