Vic: Melbourne charities slam welfare report

AAP General News (Australia)
12-14-2000
Vic: Melbourne charities slam welfare report

MELBOURNE, Dec 14 AAP - More jobs and less mutual obligation was the solution to welfare
dependency, charity groups said.

A lack of jobs was the key issue, the Brotherhood of St Lawrence said, responding to
the federal government's welfare reforms announced today.

November unemployment figures of 6.6 per cent showed the government needed to create
more long-term jobs "rather than requiring more from those without work", according to
charity executive director Father Nic (Nic) Frances.

"The government's response is out of kilter with the real situations of so many unemployed
people, sole parents and people with disabilities," he said.

Fr Frances said the government had failed to address key messages in the McClure report
on welfare reform, including breaching the unemployed only as a last resort.

Government spending on job training, child care and housing assistance was so low that
people were prevented from taking up job opportunities, he said.

The Salvation Army said mutual obligation should not be the centrepiece of the income
support system.

Less than three per cent of people using the charity's employment services were reported
because of consistent compliance breaches, according to a Salvation Army statement.

"This clearly shows that the overwhelming majority of job seekers do in fact consistently
meet the requirements required of them under our current social security system," it said.

An undue focus on people who were breached was misrepresentative and was unfair to
those struggling to find work, it said.

Melbourne Citymission said the snowballing effect created by breaching people cost
the community more.

"As more and more people are breached and denied welfare payments, more people will
default on their loans and rent," said the charity's acting CEO Anne Turley.

Ms Turley also criticised the government report for simplifying mutual obligation to
a financial transaction.

"Mutual obligation, by definition, means the government should give something back.

It is not giving enough back," she said.

Extending mutual obligation to single parents also overlooked their role in raising
children, Ms Turley said.

She said the government report failed to address the inadequacy of existing payments
and services for people in need and also failed to address the real causes of poverty,
including unemployment, housing and education.

AAP nl/clr/apm/brm

KEYWORD: WELFARE CHARITIES

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