Mrs CROSIO (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social Security) (10.13 a.m.) —I move:

  That the bill be now read a second time.

This bill gives legislative effect to several measures announced in the context of the 1993 budget and to a number of other changes. Some people with disabilities are unable to find jobs in the open labour market because their disability prevents them from being able to do the job to the level expected of people without disabilities. Under the existing award wage system, they have to be paid full award rates.

  As announced in the 1993 budget, a new payment type, disability wage supplement, will be introduced from 1 July 1994. The supplement will be based on the qualification and payability conditions for disability support pension, and will be available each year for up to 1,000 people who enter the supported wage system administered by the Department of Human Services and Health. The supported wage system aims at assisting persons with a disability to enter the work force and will provide that the person may be paid less than the award wage based on his or her productivity compared with a person in the same occupation who does not have such a disability.

  Disability wage supplement will be available at the same rates applicable to disability support pensioners and will be subject to similar rules, including the income and assets tests. As a result, income earned under the supported wage system by a disability wage supplement client will count as income for the purposes of determining a rate of disability wage supplement.

  As part of the 1993 budget process, the government agreed that, from 1 January 1995, the maximum rate of additional family payment payable in respect of children who have not turned 16 should be increased by $1 a week per child. This bill gives effect to that agreement. Approximately 800,000 low income families will benefit from this measure at an estimated cost of $45 million in 1994-95 and $46 million in 1995-96.

  To qualify for age pension, a woman currently must be 60 and a man, 65. This bill provides for amendments to be made to the Social Security Act 1991 to increase the pension age for women from 60 to 65. As announced in the 1993 budget, the increase is to be phased in over a 20-year period, starting on 1 July 1995, in recognition of any remaining labour force disadvantages incurred over the years by the older women affected by the proposal. By 1 July 2013, the women's age pension age will be 65 following pension age increases of six months every two years.

  As mentioned previously, this bill gives effect to a number of non-budgetary measures. Firstly, the Social Security Act 1991 will be amended so as to impose a cap of 50 per cent on the rate of return for shares and managed investments for ordinary income assessment purposes. It will also be amended so as to provide that the rate of return of a managed investment or listed security that has not been available for the whole of a 12-month assessment period is to be calculated on the basis of the performance of the product to date without extrapolating that performance over the 12-month period. These are beneficial measures for social security clients.

  Secondly, as a result of amendments made by the Migration Reform Act 1992 to the Migration Act 1958, major consequential changes will be made to the Migration Regulations by the Minister for Immigration and Ethnic Affairs to take effect on 1 September 1994. In turn, there is a need for amendments to be made to the Social Security Act 1991 to allow the Minister for Social Security to take account of these changes by way of disallowable instrument.

  In a general sense, these amendments will ensure that relevant provisions in the Social Security Act will either refer to visas specified in the Migration Act or, if this is not possible, allow the minister to amend references to the Migration Regulations by way of disallowable instrument.

  The third set of minor amendments are to overcome an unexpected loophole in the Social Security Act 1991 that has arisen as a result of a recent decision of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The Social Security Act has always required that, for most social security payments to be payable, the recipient must provide his or her tax file number to the department if requested to do so by the secretary.

  In 1993, the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in Re Malloch and Secretary, Department of Social Security held that the principal act does not prevent payment to persons who refuse to provide a tax file number to the department on the basis that they do not have a tax file number and have no intention of getting one. Amendments in respect of all relevant payment types are included in this bill with a view to preventing payment in the situation that arose in Malloch's case.

  Finally, the bill before the House provides for several minor amendments to be made to the Social Security Act 1991, the Veterans' Entitlements Act 1986 and the Farm Household Support Act 1992 that are consequential upon the introduction of the new home child-care and partner allowances by the Social Security (Home Child Care and Partner Allowances) Legislation Amendment Bill 1993. I commend the bill to the House.