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Keywords: Centrelink

  • AUSTRALIA

    From public good to private gain: The failure of employment services

    • John Falzon
    • 14 December 2023
    4 Comments

    No doubt there were some who genuinely believed that privatising  employment services would result in better services at a lower cost to the public purse. But the engineers of the socially destructive projects of the neoliberal era knew very well that they were more likely to result in the enrichment of some to the detriment of many.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    'They think we're rubbish': Life on welfare in Australia

    • John Falzon
    • 06 July 2023
    9 Comments

    Dr. Eve Vincent's book, 'Who Cares? Life on Welfare in Australia', provides an in-depth exploration of the intricate dance between power, control, and social policy, unearthing unsettling truths about our society's inherent power structures. This discourse further underscores the urgent need for a radical reimagining of our socio-economic systems.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    It's time we ended politically induced poverty

    • John Falzon
    • 23 March 2023
    11 Comments

    As jobseeker payments are indexed for inflation, increased payments are still well below the minimum wage and age pension. With successive neoliberal governments dismantling social infrastructure, people living in poverty have little means of escape. Poverty is not a personal choice but a political one.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    JobSeeker needs to provide a reasonable safety net

    • Joshua Lourensz
    • 04 March 2021
    4 Comments

    Many people are still doing it tough. And the many organisations who are tasked with trying to support them share a sense of dismay as we see Federal Government assistance being wound back fast. We need to increase decent work opportunities and ensure a reasonable safety net for those out of work if we want to get through this and still claim the ‘fair go’.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Jobactive and job service providers are unfit for purpose

    • Izabella Antoniou
    • 03 September 2020
    11 Comments

    Beyond the announcement of the corona supplement falling from $550 to $250 a fortnight in September, and the reintroduction of asset testing, there has been little in the way of a roadmap for our nation’s unemployed in a landscape where job seekers outnumber jobs 13:1.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Government needs to freeze rent and mortgages

    • Sangeetha Thanapal
    • 31 March 2020
    5 Comments

    The long queues outside Centrelink and the crashes on the website have fuelled the fears of many people, including myself, that one wrong sentence in the application means we will be denied relief, or worse, that even if we are eligible, the money could take weeks to come in, way past the point of financial solvency.

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  • ECONOMICS

    Economic stimulus to fight poverty

    • Bree Alexander
    • 25 February 2020
    2 Comments

    After taking account of housing costs, it is estimated that 3.24 million people, equating to more than one in eight people, are estimated to be living below the poverty line in Australia. For children, it is estimated to be one in six.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Righting the wrongs of robodebt

    • Darren O'Donovan
    • 27 November 2019
    7 Comments

    The uncertainties are not ended by last week's announcement. The statement only vaguely signals that the Department will 'work' with recipients to identify 'further proof points'. What constitutes a 'proof point'? The government needs to disavow its past conduct in a much deeper, detailed and clear way. Instead, it has gone silent.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Living in Australia's social credit dystopia

    • Kate Galloway
    • 08 October 2019
    6 Comments

    If government is concerned for citizens' wellbeing, it should properly resource services — drug and alcohol support, parenting support, subsidised childcare, education and so on. Instead, it is generating a system of social credit: rewarding those who toe the line and punishing those whose 'score' falls below that of the 'good citizen'.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    My brush with robodebt

    • Bree Alexander
    • 26 September 2019
    2 Comments

    I was heartened by the announcement Gordon Legal is pursuing a class action for robodebt victims. I am one of hundreds of thousands of people who has gone through the robodebt process. I too felt the exercise of a reverse burden of proof; guilty until proven innocent.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Robodebt at the vanguard of government power grab

    • Kate Galloway
    • 12 September 2019
    7 Comments

    A policy genuinely in support of moving into employment would not seek to capitalise on the ambiguity of accounting in the year of transition from welfare to work — which is effectively what robodebt does.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Tech obsession leaves elderly on the sidelines

    • Michele Frankeni
    • 30 April 2019
    12 Comments

    It's not just government departments that are making life difficult for those without internet access. Many elderly people have the time and inclination to volunteer for different organisations and causes, but come up against a number of rules that block their ability to give their time.

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