System ‘letting down jobless’
THE Greens have accused the Morrison government of persistently demonising jobless Australians in a bid to derail public support for a boost to dole payments.
Employment Minister Michaelia Cash released new figures yesterday showing jobseekers’ Newstart payments were suspended more than two million times in one year for missing appointments.
Another 750,000 suspensions were handed out because of “mediocre job searches” in 2018/19. There are about 710,000 people on Newstart.
The Greens say the compliance framework, which operates on a demerit points system, is punitive and makes people’s lives harder.
“The penalties, demerits and suspensions are not a reflection of people not wanting to meet their obligations and participate, they are reflective of the flawed system,” community services spokeswoman Rachel Siewert said.
“There’s basically no flexibility in the system and we know from the Senate inquiry and also from complaints we receive that people are getting penalised because of mistakes by providers. The system also does not account for the complexity of people’s lives.”
Australia’s welfare scheme has come under fire in Senate hearings for punishing people who miss appointments because they’re actually working, or because their bus was late. Social welfare advocate Ella Buckland yesterday tweeted a letter she received from Centrelink assigning her an appointment on a day she says she will be at a paid job.
“Rang. Was told it’s compulsory and if I don’t go my payments stop,” she said.
A further 540,000 suspensions were the result of people not showing up to a Jobactive
IT’S OUTRAGEOUS THIS GOVERNMENT IS USING A FLAWED SYSTEM TO DEMONISE PEOPLE ON INCOME SUPPORT ...
related activity, while 3436 job seekers were suspended due to misconduct at a meeting, activity or interview.
Senator Cash said the figures showed the targeted compliance scheme was working, with more of the suspensions occurring only once or twice.
“What these figures show is a large cohort of Jobactive participants not taking their mutual obligations seriously,” she said.
Senator Siewert said that was rubbish. “It’s outrageous that once again this government is using a flawed system to demonise people on income support,” she said.