About 330,000 people听will be pushed into poverty when the coronavirus supplement is cut again on January 1, writes Peter Boyle.
Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)
Jim McIlroy writes听the federal government is moving to extend the stigmatising cashless debit card, handing听responsibility听for vulnerable sectors to a private company.
The tide appears to be turning against the federal government鈥檚 punitive robodebt scheme, reports Kerry Smith.
It is fast becoming a recognised fact 鈥 almost a truism 鈥 that the Newstart Allowance is too low. For unemployed people trying to get by on about $300 a week ($277 without rent assistance, $227 for those under 21), this is not news.
This image captured Labor鈥檚 class betrayal on July 3, the first day of the new federal parliament, when it voted with the Coalition government for tax cuts for the rich.
From July 1, Prime Minister Scott Morrison will receive a 2% pay rise on top of his already inflated parliamentary salary. Morrison currently earns $538,460 a year and in a few weeks time will earn an additional $10,000 a year. The current base salary for federal MPs and Senators is $207,100.
The federal Coalition government's so-called "tax reform" package is, overall, a major escalation of the capitalist class war by the rich against the poor and working people.
The initial tranche of income tax measures will reduce tax by a very modest amount for low-income taxpayers, but the long-term effect of the package is to massively reduce tax on the wealthy and attack the elements of a progressive taxation system established in this country over many years.
Poverty is everywhere 鈥 in cities, towns and the bush across Australia: shivering people sleeping in doorways or cars; ragged people hanging around shopping centres begging for money or food; overstretched private welfare agencies unable to meet the requests for assistance; people turned away from emergency accommodation; and abused women and children turned away from refuges.
But those are only the most visible signs of poverty. The true extent of the poverty crisis is hidden.
As if the decision to cut the penalty rates of around 700,000 low paid workers in the retail, hospitality and fast food sectors wasn鈥檛 enough, restaurant bosses are now opposing any increase to the minimum wage.
The Australian Council of Social Services (ACOSS) said on March 7 it feared the system鈥檚 treatment of welfare recipients was scaring individuals away from exercising their right to claim income support.
Speaking as the Senate inquiry into the Centrelink debt recovery system began, ACT ACOSS Director Susan Helyar described the system as an abuse of government power that was undermining confidence in public administration.
鈥淪ome of our members have wondered whether individuals are being encouraged to stay out of the welfare system,鈥 she said.
The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) has urged Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to immediately halt Centrelink鈥檚 automated debt recovery system, protect government whistleblowers and end an ongoing 鈥渁buse of government power鈥 that is causing distress and financial hardship to some of Australia鈥檚 most vulnerable people.
ACOSS joined a wide range of charities, welfare groups, legal bodies, unions and advocacy services, which have all expressed serious reservations about the accuracy and fairness of the debt recovery system.
Treasurer Scott Morrison's speech to a Bloomberg business breakfast in Sydney on August 25 echoed previous warnings by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull that Australians were heading for economic trouble if the new parliament fails to pass the government's "omnibus" budget package.
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