The forces are with Abbott on flexible childcare

THE Labor Party's obsession with destroying Tony Abbott's credibility has backfired given Labor's overkill on Abbott's call for the Productivity Commission to assess the option of funding childcare at home.

Abbott has made an astute pitch. There are hundreds of thousands of women who will agree with him. Labor's attack spills into a patronising attitude towards women along with an ideological fixation that institutional childcare is superior to at-home childcare. Convinced it is exposing Abbott's prejudices, Labor has only exposed its own deeper prejudices. Trying to wedge Abbott, Labor has wedged itself. How could Julia Gillard, Penny Wong and Kate Ellis get this so wrong?

Abbott's proposition was deft, even cynical: he pledges that a Coalition government will ask the Productivity Commission to assess how to make the childcare rebate more flexible by extending its application to nannies at home. That is the full extent of his commitment. Yes, he has raised the aspiration, but there is no scheme or policy requiring funding. Just an inquiry.

Abbott plans to make this an election issue. Running in tandem with his expensive parental leave scheme, the purpose is to highlight his concern about helping mothers to manage both work and children and advance workforce participation as an economic reform.

In words guaranteed to infuriate Labor, Abbott said: "This is an important indication that the Coalition gets it when it comes to modern women and modern families." Labor's overkill has served Abbott superbly: it has kept in the news his popular idea of supporting nannies at home.

What does Labor say? Gillard said Abbott was "suckering women" in to pretend he cared about childcare. Penny Wong said Abbott was about "subsidising nannies". Kate Ellis, the Child Care Minister, said nannies were "often chauffeurs, they're often chefs"; some did the ironing and washing, their industry was unregulated, the idea was too expensive, it was OK to employ a nanny but, she implied, the taxpayer should not finance such home-based activity.

It was hard to imagine a more negative reaction. Labor's comprehensive rejection is based on fiscal, practical and philosophical grounds. Its female ministers, notably Ellis, sounded over-the-top. Their message was patronising: Labor knew best, Abbott was going to break the bank and any woman who thought childcare at home deserved the same financial support as institutionalised childcare wasn't smart enough to grasp the complexities. The fears were apparent: might women be stupid enough to assess Abbott's idea at face value and might women actually think he could assist childcare at home without damaging institutional childcare?

Labor's problem was soon apparent. Many leading women in public life didn't agree with Labor's rampage and welcomed a new assesssment on merit. Educator, feminist, policy and corporate adviser Wendy McCarthy told this paper: "I think Tony Abbott's proposal for a Productivity Commission inquiry is a very good idea. It hasn't happened for 15 years and we need another inquiry because a lot has happened since then. That's point number one.

"I want to insert into this debate the absolute importance of early childhood learning and development. This issue is primarily about the needs of the child and about the productivity of the workforce. That's point number two.

"In the past this has been seen as a women's rights issue, but that's now a backward perspective. This will bring down the wrath of God upon me, but I'm a bit tired of people who offer advice on how everyone should look after their children while not choosing that advice in their own lives.

"Today there are thousands of both working-class and middle-class families whose children are not being properly cared for. This is where I was disappointed with Kate Ellis. This is a very big social issue and I can't stand the talk about class warfare. I feel Tony Abbott is being very smart in seeking a community discussion around this issue and it's now time to have this discussion."

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick offered a down-to-earth view to The Weekend Australian manifestly at odds with Labor's fixations: "For many women, having a nanny, especially if they have two or three children, is a reasonable, cost-effective solution. It also helps those women who are working unusual hours. It can be a better option than long daycare." Broderick rejected the notion of a rich-poor divide as propounded by Ellis.

Last Sunday on Sky News Australian Agenda program, former ALP leader Mark Latham said Abbott probably wouldn't "do much", but "what he's done this week is devastating because he's tapped into one of the great aspirations". And Labor's response? It seeks to deny, even ridicule, such aspirations.

On the same program, former NSW Labor premier Kristina Keneally said: "I would have preferred the government response be, 'Yes, we do need to have more flexible childcare arrangements, particularly for people who work after 6pm, before 8am'." Keneally didn't think Abbott's nannies idea would work, but said she would not oppose a study into it and felt that the concept had "great aspirational pull".

When Labor cannot carry McCarthy, Broderick and Keneally on its tactics and assumptions then it has misjudged big time. How did Labor work itself into such contortions? That's easy. Its iron tactic is to use every chance to paint Abbott as fiscally irresponsible and beholden to the rich (witness his rejection of the mining tax). Wong and Ellis said their departmental costings showed Abbott's scheme would cost $2 billion over four years and that 654,000 families would face cuts to their current benefits under Abbott.

The reality, however, is that any Abbott scheme will depend on the Productivity Commission report, and its terms of reference are sure to include the revenue dividend from higher workforce participation along with any plugging of the black economy surrounding the nanny industry.

Are there problems with Abbott's idea? Of course, given that nannies often combine childcare with house duties. Rorting must be a serious, perhaps decisive, argument against his idea. McCarthy, a veteran from such debates, agrees with the type of problems raised by Ellis.

But Labor, with its refusal to means test the childcare rebate for institutional care, needs to beware running a class debate on childcare at home. Painting Abbott as pandering to rich families denigrates the entire cohort of families with nannies.

For a party on a record low primary vote, Labor's arrogance was as breathtaking as its desperation. It risks losing common sense in its pursuit of Abbott, whose social model has a far deeper appeal to voters than Labor can bear to tolerate.