Amanda Rishworth (Kingston, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to commend the member for Blaxland’s motion to the House. In these tough economic times many residents have told me they are finding it difficult to balance the family budget. These budgets that are worked out around the kitchen table every week are under a great deal of stress and pressure. Many families are facing problems with debt, be that from phone bills, credit cards or mortgages.

In this difficult climate it is important that everyone steps up to their responsibilities, and I take this opportunity to commend the work of many financial counselling services who work tirelessly to provide financial literacy and support for families who are doing it tough. I am not entirely sure where the member for Fadden got his figures, but certainly the financial counselling services in Adelaide have welcomed our government’s increase in—in fact, doubling of—money to provide financial services. They have been very pleased that they have seen this doubling of money that allows them to provide these services. However, the demand for these services has increased. One organisation, Uniting Care Wesley Adelaide, estimates that, even with this doubling of funding, it turns away 100 people looking for financial counselling appointments every week.

In response to this evident need for assistance in our community, I took the lead from the member for Blaxland and hosted my own debt relief information forum last week, on 18 February, in the Hopgood Theatre in Noarlunga. I would like to thank the many panellists and organisations that came along: St Vincent de Paul, Uniting Care Wesley, the Financial Ombudsman Service, Legal Aid, Centrelink, the Hackham West Community Centre and Anglicare. All these panellists provided some expert information that was very much appreciated by those who attended. They also provided individual stalls at which the residents who attended, after they had got general information, were able to approach the panellists for very specific information. I know that, while some people were a little embarrassed about asking questions in front of a whole lot of people, they did take the opportunity to ask questions in private. And I would like to thank everyone who gave up their time to come along because they believed that this issue is a very important one in our community. I would also like to commend the residents who attended and took that opportunity to be proactive and learn more about how to better manage their cost-of-living pressures. Janet Scott is one of the residents who decided to take the time to come along and help herself and her family be prepared for these harder economic times.

What we all learnt that night was not just how important it is to get help but also how important it is for families facing these problems to take action early. We heard this time and time again: ‘You must take action early.’ We also heard that families need to stay in touch regularly with their creditors. This information was also emphasised over and over again. We also learnt from the Legal Services Commission of South Australia that there are options. Often people feel that there are no options. However, they should get in touch and get some information, act early and stay in touch. Debt pressures can seem overwhelming and people need support to be able to respond quickly before it is too late. I hope that the forum was useful to the residents of Kingston, and I am proud to support the many non-profit organisations that do this work in our community—like the ones I have mentioned: Uniting Care Wesley, Anglicare and St Vincent de Paul, who provide full and independent financial counselling without charging the sorts of fees that others do.

I know my time is running out, but I do want to get to the essence of the motion. I am pleased that the motion before us today calls on Australian banks and financial institutions to provide support in this area. As with many other people and many organisations within the community, banks do need to stand up and take some responsibility and to utilise, as the member for Blaxland alluded to, their expertise in this area. Australian banks have a unique opportunity to help hard-hit working families by providing additional support for financial literacy and financial counselling, and I think it is very important that they do so.

At my debt relief forum, the Noarlunga experts took their time to share their advice on dealing with debt issues and I think this is incredibly important. (Time expired)

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