Ms RISHWORTH (Kingston) (11:02): I have to say that for many Australians the summer period was not what they'd hoped for. With some hope that the pandemic was slowing down, it was a difficult time for many Australians when the omicron variant hit our shores. In my electorate, businesses have had new restrictions placed on them, and indeed, many people are concerned and worried about their health. Unfortunately, many friends and family and people in my electorate have caught COVID, and it has had a rolling impact on them and their families. There has not just been the physical impact but the psychological impact on families, sitting there and trying to make a decision about whether or not to separate their households, with one adult and one child going into one part of the house and another adult and another child going into another part of the house for 10 days. That is really difficult, and it is really difficult for the children and families as well. I want to give a shout-out to all the parents in South Australia who are homeschooling again. They're back in their houses, on the internet, trying to work out how to get onto Microsoft Teams, trying to keep up with the pace of work, and feeling incredibly stressed out. It has been a difficult time. As I said, businesses, particularly in my electorate, have talked about not only the impact of the restrictions but the impact of people just not turning up. They're not coming and they're not spending money. It is a really difficult time, and it's something that people are concerned and worried about. These bills, the Appropriation (Coronavirus Response) Bill (No. 1) 2021-2022 and the Appropriation (Coronavirus Response) Bill (No. 2) 2021-2022, are about appropriations to deal with emergency funding. Labor have been clear that we won't stand in the way of important emergency funding. But what I am frustrated about, and what I think so many in my electorate and around the country are frustrated about, is that this government was not prepared for the outbreak of omicron. Late last year we had the government saying: 'Yes, the pandemic is over. Delta is over. We're going to get back to life. Get government out of your life. There is no role for us anymore. Just live your life. It's all going to be fine.' That meant that the federal government did not take the appropriate steps and measures to put plans in place to deal with an inevitable outbreak. There was no focus on making sure we had stocks of rapid antigen tests. I will talk in particular about the impact that that had on the early childhood sector. There was no impetus or excitement around boosters. In fact, there was a laissez-faire approach to encouraging people to get their boosters: get it if you want to. It took some time for the Australian government to focus its attention on that. Omicron was already circulating quite widely in the community. That is too late to get your booster shot! This government was not prepared when it came to that. It was particularly unprepared in the early childhood sector. I need to give a shout out to all those educators, all those centre directors and all those in early education who stayed and kept their doors open during this pandemic to make sure kids were looked after and getting their early education and that families were supported. They were doing their job. As omicron hit and as the sector cried for help, once again, the government failed to react. It is really, really puzzling. In estimates last year, a Labor senator asked the government what they were doing to prepare for the next wave, what they were doing in terms of ventilation standards and national guidance for early education centres and what they were doing to ensure that there was a proper vaccine rollout for early education. They couldn't even tell us how many early educators had had their vaccine. They said it wasn't the Commonwealth's role. Now we are seeing the impact of that plan. Since the start of the omicron outbreak, educators and centre directors once again have been working hard to keep their doors open. But they have had to close for thousands of services temporarily. There are a hundred services closed at the moment because of an outbreak. Thousands more services are being directly impacted as early educators or children become infected and are directed to isolate. Children are not able to attend care. Educators are not able to turn up to work. So many early learning services have been left in a pretty precarious position. In late January I held another crisis meeting with early educators—this was after a number I've had to hold throughout this pandemic—to hear directly from frontline services how the sector was managing. The overwhelming feedback from services was that they were struggling to remain viable through a combination of falling attendances, serious staff shortages, confusing isolation and testing rules, a shortage of rapid antigen tests, and a lack of information about ventilation standards and what they needed to do. In fact, a lot of early learning services had to make it up themselves. Staff and educator shortages are severe—and educators were in short supply before COVID. But the COVID pandemic and omicron outbreak have exposed a decade of neglect when it comes to investing in the early learning workforce. Many educators have had to use personal or annual leave to isolate at home because of the restricted eligibility to qualify for paid pandemic leave. This is a really big issue that the government has failed to acknowledge. These workers have to go home to protect other workers and small children yet cannot qualify for paid pandemic leave. Many workers have already used all their sick leave or don't get sick leave because they're casual staff. This is unfair and unsustainable. Educators have also been under a great deal of psychological stress—not just physical stress, but psychological stress—and their mental health is suffering. This feedback has been coming back loud and clear. It really is incumbent on the federal government to pay some attention to the mental wellbeing of our educators. Just like everything with the federal government, they will probably say, 'Well, that's a state's responsibility.' But let me remind the House that the federal government in this country funds long day care and after-school and vacation care. They set the quality standards. There can't be any passing of the buck, like they tried to do on aged care. They need to step up and take responsibility. Families are keeping their children at home when they are close contacts and are being forced to pay for care they cannot use. As a result, some are choosing to withdraw their children from care, dealing a financial blow to those services. What adds to the frustration and stress is the fact that we do need leadership from the government, but we are not getting it. I have written to the Acting Minister for Education and Youth, because we don't actually have a permanent education minister at the moment, and I have not heard back. But I feel that I need to remind all the ministers that it's their actual day job to get on and fix this problem: stop this infighting, stop the navel-gazing that the government are doing and actually fix the real-life problems that are out there. They didn't plan for these problems, but they really should play catch-up. Finally, every financial rescue package that the government has implemented in early education has been complex and has been reinvented because it starts at a new beginning every time. It is time that the government put their heads down and thought of a long-term solution to this because omicron might not be the last wave of this pandemic. I hope it is; I really hope that we see an end to this pandemic sooner rather than later. But if history tells us anything, there are likely to be spikes in this infection or indeed other variants. We need to be prepared. We can't continually play catch-up, because people out there are suffering. I urge the acting minister and the Minister for Education and Youth, when he comes back, to fix this problem, to look at some long-term solutions and, most importantly, to take some leadership—step up, take some responsibility, stop dodging and weaving and blaming other people, as this government tends to do, and actually fix the problem. Families in this country need it to be fixed, children need it to be fixed and of course our early education workforce need it to be fixed. It is desperate out there, it is difficult out there and it's time the government acted.