Senator O'NEILL (New South Wales) (15:27): What a shock it is that we've got all blokes on that side speaking on this issue when we've been asking them to verify the fact that they have failed women during this massive crisis facing Australia. COVID-19 is an experience that many of us could not have imagined and the burden of care has fallen heavily on the women of this nation. I am proud to be an Australian woman in the Labor Party. There are many of us. We are varied and we are very different. We bring our perspectives to this place in many, many more numbers than you guys. On this side of the chamber, we've got a few more women here in the Senate. But you couldn't line up one woman today to stand up to answer our questions about women being affected by COVID. You left it to the blokes again—your usual standard— Senator Dean Smith: Madam Deputy President, on a point of order on quotas— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: That's not a point of order, Senator Smith. Please resume your seat. Please continue, Senator O'Neill. Senator O'NEILL: We've heard this bleating and moaning from these poor men opposite, who are denying even what the minister said in the other place. The women have been hardest hit through COVID-19—and that is quoting— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator O'Neill, please resume your seat. Senator Smith. Senator Dean Smith: For those people who are not able to watch on television: one-third of the Labor senators opposite are men— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Smith, are you raising a point of order? If you're not, please refrain from interrupting. Senator O'Neill. Senator O'NEILL: I can tell I've hit a raw nerve, because Senator Smith is actually one of the more exemplary senators on the other side and I can see I've even upset him. So I consider that quite effective in arguing the point that this government— The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator O'Neill, please resume your seat. A point of order, Senator Smith? Senator Dean Smith: I was just going to comment on Senator O'Neill's accurate reflection on me! The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Smith, that is not a point of order. Senators have the right to be heard in silence. People jumping up and making spurious points of order fits into the category of not being respectful to the senator making their contribution. Please continue, Senator O'Neill. Senator O'NEILL: I've heard of mansplaining, but I think we've got 'man-interrupting' going on here against a woman speaking her mind, an Australian Labor woman speaking to the reality of Australian women who are at this very time making decisions in one critical by-election in the seat of Eden-Monaro. They've got a choice between sending another bloke to Canberra like this lot or sending a great woman in the shape of Kristy McBain, and I encourage them to do that. The problem with this government is that it simply does not listen to the voices of women and it does not understand the challenges of being a woman in Australia and, if its members are going to call being a woman in Australia and standing up for women 'identity politics', then they need to go back and learn a few understandings about what identity politics actually is. Minister Ley in the other place declared that women have been hardest hit through COVID-19. And what I'm worried about, as an Australian woman standing up for women impacted, is that this government has lined up a set of policies by which we are set to snap back to unaffordable child care. Right around this country, women are talking to me. They're talking to their partners. They're sitting at dining room tables figuring out how much they can actually manage in terms of putting food on the table or paying for child care because this government has so mismanaged the whole childcare sector. They are dudding aged-care workers, not providing them with the promised money that they announced. We see this time and time again: a series of announcements from this government and then a failure to deliver. They're taking away from childcare workers. They are refusing paid parental leave. These are the priorities of this government. At the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis—in response to great, passionate advocacy by the unions of this country, the big businesses of this country and the Labor Party, and when we begged and pleaded with this government to provide wage subsidies—it finally came through with jobseeker. Yes, they came through with it, but who did they take it away from first? They took it away from the women of Australia. They took it away from the childcare workers, the most female dominated industry in this country. Women in Australia need to remember that this government does not stand up for them. The Liberal-National government have failed Australians. It's a matter of international record. In the World Economic Forum's The Global Gender Gap Report 2013, Australia was 23rd in the rankings in terms of women's economic capacity. After seven years of this blokey dominated LNP government that's out of touch with the women of Australia, the reality now is that we've slipped all the way down to 44th of 153 countries. And after what the government has done in response to COVID, I have no expectation that our position will rise. In fact, I'm sure it will get even worse. We know that this government has failed Australian women. As the Labor Party, we are very concerned that child care will not be accessible to women, that they won't be able to get back to work and that there will be barriers to their participation in the economy and the society. We are concerned that Scott Morrison's snapback will actually be a job crusher for the women of Australia. Question agreed to.